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TESSA WADSWORTH’S DISCIPLINE. 


BOOKS BY rrss DRINKWATER. 

I 

I. Only Ned ; or, Grandmamma’s Lesson. i6mo. $1.25 

“ New England is full of sharp points, strong, rugged, and abundant in light 
and shadows as her own granite hills. An illustration of these personal anc 
social peculiarities is to be found in this healthy, stirring, and thoroughly natura 
book. The loving old grandma, hard aunt, bright cousin, true and tough Dea 
con Griggs, judicious school-master, and boiling, bursting Ned Arrowsmith, an 
all true to life. We like them all.” — Christian Advocate. 

II. Not Bread Alone; or, Miss Helen’s Neigh- 
bors. i6mo |i-2f 

"This is a charming book, designed to illustrate the relation of prayer t( 
every-day life. Miss Helen is a very lovely character, wielding an influenc* 
over her young neighbors and leading them, unconsciously it may be, to i 
clearer understanding of the nature of that intimate communion with God whicl 
can be acquired only through prayer. It is attractively written, and can no 
fail to interest and entertain.” — Baptist Union., 

III. Fred and Jeanie, and how they Learned about 

God. i6mo. . $1-25 

" The author, as in her previous books, shows an intimate knowledge of chile 
life, and the children that she delights in are very engaging. It would be hare 
for any body to read the story without a softening of the hard spots in his nature 
and a gathering moisture in the eye. It is most attractively written.” — Nortp 
Christian Advocate. 

IV. Tessa Wadsworth’s Discipline . . . . $1.50 


ROBERT CARTER & BROTHERS. 


Tessa Wadsworth's 
Discipline. 


BY 


JENNIE M. DRINKWATER, 

AUTHOR OF “/ 2 oT BREAD ALONE,” ETC. 

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V si-' COPYRIGK^-^f^, 

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NEW YORK: 

ROBERT CARTER & BROTHERS, 

530 Broadway. 


1879. 


Citol 


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Copyright 1879, 

By Robert Carter & Brothers, 


Cambridge: 

PRESS OF 

JOHN WILSON AND SON. 


ST. JOHNLAND 
STEREOTYPE FOUNDRY, 
SUFFOLK CO., N. Y. 


^ ebicat ion* 

TO 

MY FRIEND 


Mary V. Childs. 


W'*i^y>^.^,iB¥''^'t}C ... 






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CONTENTS. 


1. Hearts that Seemed to Differ 9 

2. The Silent Side 20 

3. The Last Night of the Old Year .... 31 

4. Somebody New 55 

5. Hearts THAf were Waiting 65 

6. Another Opportunity 81 

7. The Long Day 90 

8. A Note out of Tune 101 

9. The New Morning . 140 

10. Forgetting the Bread 156 

11. On the Highway 162 

12. Good Enough to be True 178 

13. The Heart of Love 188 

14. Wheat, not Bread 211 

15. September 217 

16. A Tangle 244 

17. The Night Before 258 

18. Moods 280 

19. The Old Story 293 


8 


CONTENTS. 


20. Several Things 305 

21. Through , . . . 330 

22. Several Other Things 338 

23. What She Meant 362 

24. Shut in 367 

25. Blue Myrtle 377 

26. Another May 390 

27. Sunset 397 

28. Hearts Alike 405 


TESSA WADSWORTH’S DISCIPLINE. 


I. 

HEARTS THAT SEEMED TO DIFFER. 

She was standing one afternoon on the broad pi- 
azza, leaning against the railing, with color enough 
in her usually colorless cheeks as she watched the 
tall figure passing through the low gateway; he 
turned^ towards the watching eyes, smiled, and 
touched his hat. 

“You will be in again this week,” she said coax- 
ingly, “ you can give me ten minutes out of your 
busy-ness.” 

“Twice ten, perhaps.” 

The light that flashed into her eyes was her 
only reply; she stood leaning forward, playing 
with the oleander blossoms under her hand until 
he had seated himself in his carriage and driven 
away; not until the brown head and straw hat 
had disappeared behind the clump of willows at 
the corner did she stir or move her eyes, then the 
happy feet in the bronze slippers tripped upstairs 
to her own chamber. Dinah had left her slate on 


10 


TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 


a chair, and dropped her algebra on the carpet, at 
the sound of Norah’s voice below the window. 

Tessa was glad to be alone; she was always 
glad to be alone after Ealph Towne had left her, to 
think over all that he had said, and to feel again 
the warm shining of his brown eyes ; to thank God 
with a few, low, joyful exclamations that He had 
brought this friend into her life ; and then, as fool- 
ish women will, she must look into her own face 
and try to see it as he saw it, — cheeks aglow, trem- 
ulous lips, and such a light in the blue eyes ! 

She did not know that her eyes could look like 
that. She had thought them pale, cold, meaning- 
less, and now they were like no eyes that she had 
ever looked into ; a dancing, tender, blue delight. 

Had he read her secret in them ? 

Her enthusiasm with its newness, sweetness, and 
freshness, — for it was as fresh as her heart was 
pure, — was moulding all her thoughts, strengthen- 
ing her desire to become in all things true and 
womanly, and making her as blithe all day long 
as the birds that twittered in the apple-tree near 
her chamber window. 

It mattered not how her hands were busied so 
long as her heart could be full of him. And he, 
Ealph Towne, blind and obtuse as any man would 
be who lived among books and not in the world at 
all, and more than a trifle selflsh, as men some- 
times find themselves to be, little thinking of the 
effect of his chance visits and fitful attentions, 
had in the last two months come to a knowledge 


HEARTS THAT SEEMED TO DIFFER. 11 


that grieved him ; for he was an honorable man, he 
loved God and reverenced^ womankind. He had 
not time now to think of any thing but the book 
for which he was collecting material. It was some- 
thing in the natural history line, he had once told 
her, but he never cared to speak of it ; indeed Ealph 
Towne cared to talk but of few things; but she 
loved to talk and he loved to listen. He loved to 
listen to her, but he did not love her (so he assured 
himself), he only loved her presence, as he loved 
the sunshine, and he did not love the sunshine 
well enough to fret when the day was gloomy ; in 
these days he did not love any body or any thing 
but himself, his books, and his mother. 

Dunellen said that he was proud of his money 
and proud of a great-great-grandmother who had 
been cousin to one of the prasident’s wives; but 
Tessa knew that he was not proud of any thing 
but his beautiful white-haired mother. 

Not understanding the signs of love, how could 
he know that Tessa Wadsworth was growing to 
love him; he had never thought of himself as par- 
ticularly worth loving. Surely she knew a dozen 
men who were handsomer (if that were what she 
cared for), and another dozen who could talk and 
tell stories and say pretty things to women (if that 
were what attracted her) ; still he knew to-day that 
his presence and light talk (he did not remember 
that he had said any thing to be treasured) had 
moved her beyond her wont. She was usually 
only self-contained and dignified; but to-day there 


12 


TESSA WADSWORTH'S DISCIPLINE. 


must have been some adequate cause for her chang- 
ing color, for the lighting and deepening of her 
eyes as they met his so frankly ; he was sure to- 
day of what he had only surmised before, — that 
this sensitive, high-spirited, pure-hearted woman 
loved him as it had never entered his preoccupied 
mind or selfish heart to love her or indeed any 
human being. 

“I have been a fool !” he ejaculated. “Well, it is 
done, and, with a woman like her, it can not be un- 
done ! Miserable bungler that I am, I have been 
trying to make matters better, and I have made 
them a thousand times worse ! Why did I promise 
to call again this week ? Why did I give her a 
right to ask me? I wish that I had seen 

her ! God knows,” — she would never have forgot- 
ten his eyes could^he have seen them at this in- 
stant, penitent and self-reproachful, — “that I did 
not mean to trifle with her.” 

Meanwhile, resting in Dinah’s chair, with the 
algebra and slate at her feet, she was thinking 
over and over the words he had spoken that after- 
noon ; very few they were, but simple and sincere ; 
at least so they sounded to her. She smiled as 
“ I do care very much ” repeated itself to her, with 
the tone and the raising of the eyes. 

“Very much!” as much as she did? It was 
about a trifle, some little thing that she had put 
into rhyme for him; how many rhymes she had 
written for him this summer! He so often said, 
“Write this up for me,” and she had so intensely 


HEARTS THAT SEEMED TO DIFFER. 13 


enjoyed the doing it, and so intensely enjoyed his 
appreciation — his over -appreciation, she always 
thought. 

0, Tessa, Tessa, pick up that algebra, and go 
to work with it. Life’s problems are too complex 
for your unworldliness. 

She stooped to pick up Dinah’s slate, and, in- 
stead of finishing the work upon it, she wrote out 
rapidly a thought that had tinged her cheeks while 
Kalph Towne had been with her. The silent side 
she called it. Was it the silent side? If it were, 
how was it that he understood? She knew that 
he understood ; she knew that he had understood 
when he answered, “Twice ten, perhaps.” 

Her mother’s voice below broke in upon her rev- 
erie; fancy, sentiment, or delicate feeling of any 
kind died a hard and sudden^death under Mrs. 
Wadsworth’s influence, yet she read more novels 
than did either of her daughters, and would cry 
her lovely eyes red and swollen over a story that 
Tessa would not deign to skip through. It was 
one of her mother’s plaints that Tessa had no 
feeling. 

Kalph Towne did not give the promised “ twice 
ten ” minutes that week, nor for weeks afterward ; 
she met him several times driving with his moth- 
er, or with his mother and Sue Greyson ; her glad, 
quick look of recognition was acknowledged by a 
lifting of the hat and a “ good afternoon. Miss Tes- 
sa.” Once she met him alone with Sue Greyson. 
Sue’s saucy, self-congratulatory toss of the head 


14 TESSA WADSWORTH'S DISCIPLINE. 

stung her so that she could have cried out. “ I 
am ashamed — no, I am not ashamed to tell you 
that she cried herself to sleep that night, as she 
asked God to bless Kalph Towne and make him 
happy and good. She could not have loved Kalph 
Towne if she might not have prayed for him. Her 
mother would have been inexpressibly shocked at 
^siich a mixture of “ love and religion.” 

“How long have you loved Christ?” asked the 
minister, when Tessa was “examined” for admis- 
sion to the church. 

“Ever since I have known Him,” was the timid 
reply. 

And Kalph Towne, in these miserable days, for 
he loas miserable, as miserable in his fashion as sKe 
was in hers, was blaming her and excusing him- 
self What hod he ever said to her? Was every 
one of a man’s words to be counted ? There was 
Sue Greyson, why didn’t she turn sentimental about 
him ? True, he had said one day when they were 
talking about friendship — what had he said that 
day? Was she remembering that? If she had 
studied his words — ^but of course, she had forgot- 
ten ! What had possessed him to say such things ? 
But how could he look at her and not feel impelled 
to say something warm ? It could not be his fault ; 
it must be hers, for leading him on and for remem- 
bering every trivial word. And of that she was 
equally sure, for how could he do any man or any 
woman wrong, this sincere and honorable Chris- 
tian gentleman ? 


HEARTS THAT SEEMED TO DIFFER. 16 


In her imagination there was no one in a book 
or out of a book like Kalph Towne. Gus Hammer- 
ton was a scholar and a gentleman, but she had 
known him all her life; Felix Harrison was gra- 
cious and good, but he was not like Kalph Towne. 
Kalph Towne was not her ideal, he was something 
infinitely better than she could think; how beauti- 
ful it was to find some one nobler and grander than 
her ideal ! Far away in some wonderful, unknown 
region he had grown up and had been made ready 
for her, and now he had come to meet her ; bewil- 
dered and grateful, she had loved him and be- 
lieved in him — almost as if that unknown region 
were heaven. 

It was her wildest dream come true; that is, 
it had come true, until lately. Some strange thing 
was happening ; it was happening and almost break- 
ing her heart. 

“Tessa, you look horrid nowadays,” exclaimed 
Dinah, one afternoon, as Tessa came up on the 
piazza,- returning from her usual walk. “You are 
white, and purple, and all colors, and you never 
sing about the house or talk to me or to any body. 
You actually ran away while Mrs. Bird was over 
here yesterday, and you don’t even go to see Miss 
Jewett ! She asked me yesterday if you had gone 
away. When Laura was talking to you yesterday, 
you looked as if you did not hear one word she 
said.” 

“ I was listening.” 

“ And you used to have such fun talking to Gus ; 


16 


TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 


I believe that you went up-stairs while he was here 
last night.” 

“ I had a headache; 1 excused myself.” 

“You always go down the road. Why don’t you 
go through Dunellen ? ” 

“I want to get into the country; I never walk 
through a street simply for the pleasure of it. I 
like to be alone.” 

“Do you ever walk as far as Old Place?” 

“That isn’t far, only three miles; sometimes I 
go to Mayfield, that is a mile beyond Old Place.” 

“Isn’t Old Place splendid? Next to Mr. Gesner’s 
it is the handsomest place around.” 

“It is more home-like than Mr. Gesner’s.” 

“ Sue likes Mr. Gesner’s better. I told her that I 
would take Old Place and she could have Mr. Ges- 
ner’s. Mr. Gesner’s is stone ; Old Place is all wood. 
Do you ever see any of the Townes ? ” 

“There are not many to be seen.” 

“ Counting Sue, there are three. Sue thinks that 
she is stylish, driving around with Mrs. Towne. 
She stayed a week with Miss Gesner once, too. 
Why don’t you and I get invited around to such 
places? Mrs. Towne ought to invite you. Mr. 
Towne used to come here often enough.” 

“ Used to come ! ” Tessa shivered standing in 
the sunlight. “Yes, it was ‘used to come,’” she 
was thinking. “ I have been dreaming, now I am 
awake. I wish that I had died while I was dream- 
ing.” 

“ Now you look pale again ! I guess you are grow- 


HEARTS THAT SEEMED TO DIFFER. 17 


ing up,” laughed unconscious Dinah; “it’s hateful 
and horrid to grow up ; I never shall. Eemember 
that I am always to be fifteen.” 

“ I hope that you never will grow up,” said Tessa, 
earnestly, “ every thing is just as bad as you can 
dream.” 

“ Mr. Towne has given Sue coral ear-rings,” Dinah 
ran on. Tessa had gone down to her fiower-bed to 
pull a few weeds that had pushed themselves in 
among her pansies. “ He gave his mother several 
groups in stone for the dining-room ; they are all 
funny. Sue says. In one, some children are playing 
doctor; in another, they are playing school. He 
gave his cousin a silk dress, and he bought him- 
self a set of books for his birthday; he was thirty- 
two. Did you think he was so old ? ” 

“Yes.” 

“I say, Tessa, Sue thinks that she is going to 
marry him.” 

“ Does she ? ” The voice was away down in the 
flowers. 

“You are always among those flowers. Don’t you 
wish that we had a conservatory? They have a 
grand one at Old Place. I wonder why they have 
so little company.” 

“Mrs. Towne is feeble; she likes a quiet house.” 

“Yes, Sue says that. But Grace Geer, his cousin, 
is there ! Mrs. Towne is to give Old Place and all 
its treasures to Mr. Towne upon his wedding-day; 
she wants a daughter more than any thing. Sue 
says. I wish she would take me. Sue thinks that 
2 


18 


TESSA WADSWORTH^S DISCIPLINE. 


elie will take her. Every other word that she speaks 
is ‘Mr. Ealph.’ She talks about him everywhere! 
Do you believe it ? ” 

“Believe what?” 

Tessa had returned to the piazza with a bunch 
of pansies. 

“Believe that she will marry him! She has real 
pretty manners when she is with them, and really 
tries not to talk slang. But I don’t believe it. He 
treats her as he would treat any one else ; I have 
seen them together.” 

“Perhaps she will. People say so,” said Tessa. 

Poor motherless, sisterless Sue! Was she mak- 
ing a disappointment for herself out of nothing? 
Or was it out of a something like hers ? 

It was certainly true that Sue Greyson had taken 
a summer tour with Mrs. Towne and Mr. Ealph 
Towne, and that she had spent more of her time 
during the last year at Old Place than in her own 
small, unlovely home. She loved her father “ well 
enough,” she would have told you; but after the 
months at Old Place, she found the cottage*in Dun- 
ellen a stale and prosaic affair ; her father had old 
Aunt Jane to keep house for him, why did he need 
her? He would have to do without her some day. 
Doctor Lake was great fun, why could he not be 
interested in him? 

“ He is a stranger, not my only daughter,” her 
father had once replied. 

“Your father will be glad enough and proud 
enough that he let you come to Old Place,” com- 


HEARTS THAT SEEMED TO DIFFER. 19 


forted Grace Geer, when Sue told her that he missed 
her at home. “ Kalph Towne’s wife will be a happy 
woman for more reasons than one; and he is inter- 
ested in you, as one can see at a glance. He told 
his mother to-day that he should always be glad 
that they had cqjne to Old Place.” 


IL 


THE SILENT SIDE. 

It was nearly six weeks after tke day that she 
had watched him as far as the clump of willows 
that he came again. Sue Greyson had driven him 
into Dunellen that morning and had stopped at the 
gate on her return to tell her about her “grand 
splendid, delightful times” at Old Place. 

“Cousin Grace has gone away; how we miss her 
music! Mr. Kalph did not care for it, but Mrs. 
Towne and I cared. Mrs. Towne says that I ought 
to have a music teacher ; but I never did practice 
when I had one. I can’t apply my mind to any 
thing ; Mr. Kalph says that I learn by observation. 
I wonder why wise men choose silly wives always,” 
she added consciously, playing with the reins. 

“Do they?” asked Tessa, picking a lilac leaf from 
the shrubbery. 

“ Cousin Grace says so. I wish I knew what ails 
Mr. Ralph. His motbier says that he is having a 
worry ; she alwaj^s knows when he is having a worry 
by his eyes ; they do look very melancholy, and last 
night I overheard him say to Mrs. Towne, ‘ A man 


THE SILENT SIDE. 


21 


has to keep his eyes pretty wide open not to step 
on peoples’ toes.’ I didn’t think much of that, but 
he said afterward, ‘ A man may do in an hour what 
he can’t undo in a lifetime.’ He never talks much, 
so I know that something is on his mind, or he would 
not have talked so long. She said that he must be 
patient and do right.” 

“Why, Sue, you did not listen!” 

“ Of course not. They were in the library, and 
I was on the balcony outside the window. I heard 
his voice — he was walking up and down, and, I 
confess, I did want to know what it was all about I 
I thought that it might be about me, you know. 
But I can’t stay here all day ; Mrs. Towne is to take 
me to spend the day with the Gesners. It is splen- 
did there. Mr. John Gesner I don’t like, but Mr. 
Lewis Gesner treats me so respectfully and talks 
to me as if he liked to hear me talk. And Miss 
Gesner is loveliness personified! Mr. Towne said 
that he had a call to make this afternoon, and 
would walk home. He will be up in the four 
o’clock train.” 

“ A call to make ! ” 

The words were in her ears all day ; she dressed 
for her walk, then concluded to stay at home. 
How could he undo what he had so thoughtlessly, 
so mercilessly, done? Would he come and talk to 
her as he had talked to his mother? Would he 
say, “ I am sorry that you havi misinterpreted 
my words ? ” Misinterpreted ! Did they not both 
speak English? Sincere, straightforward, frank 


22 


TESSA WADSWORTH^ S DISCIPLINE. 


English ? It was the only language that she 
knew. In what tongue had he spoken to her ? 

Her fluttering reverie was brought to a sudden 
and giddy end; the sound of a firm tread on the 
dried leaves under the maple -trees outside the 
gate, a tall figure in plain, elegant black, — the 
startled color in her eyes told the rest ; she sprang 
to her feet, dropped her long, white work, shook 
off all outward nervousness, brushed her hair, 
fastened a bow of blue ribbon down low on her 
braids, questioned her eyes and lips to ascertain if 
they were sq/e, and then passed down the stair- 
way with a light, sure tread, and stood on the 
piazza to welcome Kalph Towne; her own com- 
posed, womanly self, rather more self-repressed 
than usual, and with a slight stateliness that she 
had never assumed with him. But he only noted 
that she appeared well and radiant ; he understood 
her no more — than he understood several other 
things. Ealph Towne had been called “slow” 
from his babyhood. 

“ Is not this what we usually call the Indian 
summer? We have not had frost yet, I think,” 
she said easily. 

His dark face crimsoned, he answered briefly, 
and dropped her hand. 

If he had ever prided himself upon his tact, he 
was aware that to-day it would be a most miser- 
able failure. How could he say, “You have mis- 
understood me,” when perhaps it was he who had 
misunderstood her? He had come to her to-day 


THE SILENT SIDE. 


23 


by sheer force of will, not daring to stay away 
longer — and what had he come for ? To assure her 
— perhaps he did not intend to assure her any 
thing ; perhaps it was not necessary to assure her 
any thing. Not very long ago he had assured 
her that he could become to her her “ ideal of a 
friend,” if she would “ show” him how. Poor Tes- 
sa! This showing him how was weary work. 
“Yes,” he replied, wheeling a chair nearer the 
open window, “ the country is beautiful.” 

That look about her flexible lips was telling its 
own story ; she was just the woman, he reasoned, 
to break her heart about such a fellow as he was. 

“ I have very little time for any thing outside 
my work,” he said, running on with his mental 
comments. All a man had to do to make himself 
a hero was to let a woman like this fall in love 
with him. 

“What have you been doing?” he asked in his 
tone of sincere interest. 

“ All my own doings,” she said lightly. “ Mr. 
Hammerton and I have been writing a criticism 
upon a novel and comparing notes, and I have 
sewed, as all ladies do, and walked.” 

“You are an English girl about walking.” ‘ 

“ I know every step of the way between Dunel- 
len and Mayfleld. Do you walk ? ” 

“No, I drive. My life has a lack. My book is 
falling through. I do not find much in life.” 

“ Our best things are nearest to us, close about 
our feet,” she answered. 


24 


TESSA WADSWORTH^ S DISCIPLINE. 


He did not reply. Ealph Towne never replied 
unless he chose. 

He opened his watch; he had been with her 
exactly ten minutes. 

“ I have an engagement at six,” he said. 

The flexible lips stifiened. “ Do not let me de- 
tain you.” 

He was regarding her with a smile in his eyes 
that she could not interpret; her graceful head 
was thrown back against the mass of flufiy white 
upon the chair, the white softening the outlines 
of a face that surely needed not softening; the 
clear, unshrinking eyes meeting his with all her 
truth in them ; the blue ribbon at her throat, the 
gray cashmere falling around her, touched him 
with a sense of fltness; the slight hands clasping 
each other in her lap, slight even with their 
strength, partly annoyed, partly baffled him. Mr. 
Hammerton had told her that she had wilful 
hands. 

Regarding Tessa Wadsworth as regarding some 
other things, Ralph Towne thought because he felt ; 
he could not think any further than he thought 
to-day, because he had not felt any further. 

There was another friend in her life Avho with 
Tessa Wadsworth as with -some other things felt 
because he thought, and he could not feel any fur- 
ther than he felt to-day because he had not thought 
any further.* 

For the first time since she had known Ralph 
Towne, she was wishing that he were like Gus 


THE SILENT SIDE. 


25 


Hammerton. It had never occurred to her before 
to wish that he would change. 

Each smiled under the survey. He was think- 
ing, “ I wish I loved you.” She was thinking, 
“You are a dear, big boy; I wish you were more 
manly.” 

“You did not send me the poem you promised.” 

“You said you would come soon.” 

“Did you expect me?” 

“Had I any reason to doubt your word?” 

“You must not take literally all I say,” he an- 
swered with irritation. 

“ I have learned that. I have studied the world’s 
arithmetic, but I do not use it to solve any word 
of yours, any more than I have supposed that you 
would use it to find the meaning of any problem 
you might discover in my attitude towards you.” 

“It is best not to dig and delve for a meaning. 
Miss Tessa; society sanctions many phrases that 
you would not speak in sincerity.” 

“Society!” she repeated in a tone that brought 
the color to his forehead. “Is society my law- 
giver?” 

It was very pleasant to be loved by a woman like 
this woman ; he could not understand her, but she 
touched him like the perfume of the white rose, or 
the note of the thrush. His next words were sin- 
cere and abrupt. “You asked me some time since 
to burn the package of poems you have written for 
me. If I had done as much for you, would you 
destroy them ? ” 


26 


TESSA WADSWORTH^S DISCIPLINE. 


A flusli, a dropping of tlie eyes, and a low laugh 
answered him. 

He arose quickly, with a motion of tossing off an 
ugly sensation. “I am very much engaged; I do 
not know when I can come again. We are going 
west for the winter.” 

She could not lift her eyes, or speak, or catch her 
breath. She arose, slowly, as if the movement 
were almost too great an effort, and stood leaning 
against the tall chair, her fingers fumbling with 
the fringe of the tidy; the room had become so 
darkened that the white fringe was but a^ dark 
outline of something that she could feel. 

“Sue Greyson is to accompany my mother; I 
shall be much away, and I do not like to leave her 
with strangers.” 

“Sue is pleasant and lively.” She had spoken, 
and now she could, not quite clearly yet, but a 
glance revealed the blood surging to his forehead, 
the veins swollen in his temples, even through the 
heavy mustache she discerned the twitching of his 
lips. The pain in her heart had opened her eyes 
wide. Had he come to make the parting final? 
What had she done that he should thus thrust her 
away outside of all the interests in his life ? Did 
he know how she cared, and was he so sorry? Was 
he trying to be “patient,” as his mother had ad- 
vised — patient with her for taking him at his 
word ? 

Dunellen had called her proud ; this instant she 
was as humble as a child. 


THE SILENT SIDE. 


27 


Slowly and sorrowfully slie said, “ Come again — 
some time.” 

“Yes,” he said, as slowly and as sorrowfully, “I 
will.” 

He was very sorry for this woman who had been 
so foolish as to think that his words had meant so 
much. 

She had closed the street door and was on the 
first step of the stairs when her mother called to 
her from the sitting-room. 

“What did Sir Dignified Undemonstrative have 
to say for himself?” 

“ He does not talk about himself” 

“It is your turn to get tea! It is Bridget’s after- 
noon out.” 

Mrs. Wadsworth was a little lady something less 
than five feet in height, as slight as a girl of twelve, 
and prettier than either of her daughters; with 
brown hair, brown eyes, and the sprightliest man- 
ner possible. 

“Young enough to be Tessa’s sister,” Dunellen 
declared. 

But she was neither sister nor mother as her 
elder daughter defined the words. 

“If you get him, Tessa, you’ll get a catch,” re- 
marked Mrs. Wadsworth watching the effect of her 
words. 

The first sound of her mother’s voice had brought 
her to herself, her self-contained, cautious, and, 
oftentimes, sarcastic self 

“Have you any order about tea?” 


28 


TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 


Her studied respect toward her mother, was 
pitiful sometimes. It was hard that she could not 
attain somewhat of her ideal of daughterhood. 

“No, but I want you to do an errand for me after 
tea. I forgot to ask Dine to do it on her way from 
school.” 

“Very well,” she assented obediently. 

She stumbled on the basement stairs, and found 
the kitchen so dark that she groped her way to 
a chair and sank into it, dropping her head on the 
table. She could hear nothing, see nothing, feel 
nothing — the whole earth was empty ! 

Where was God ? Had He gone, too ? 

Through the open windows floated the sound of 
girls’ voices, as Norah and Dinah chatted and 
laughed in the garden. But the sound was far 
off ; the engine whistled and screamed, but the 
sound was not in her world ; carriages rolled past, 
the front gate swung to, her father’s step was on 
the piazza over her head, and he was calhng, her 
dear old father, “Where are you all, my three 
girls ? ” 

His fulfllled hope was bitterer than all her dis- 
appointments ever could be. 

“I don’t wonder,” she said with a sob in her 
throat, as she arose and pushed her hair back, “ I 
don’t wonder that he can not love me ; but oh, I 
wish that he had not told me a lie ! ” 

October passed; the days hurried into November; 
there was no more leaf-hunting for her, no more 
long walks down the beautiful country road, no 


THE SILENT SIDE. 


29 


more tripping up and down stairs with a song or 
a hymn on her lips, no more of life, she would 
have said, for every thing seemed like death. She 
did not die with shame, as at first she was sure 
that she would do ; she could not run away to the 
far end of the earth where she would never again 
see his face ; where every face would be a new face, 
where no voice would speak his name ; she could 
not dig a hole in the earth and creep into it; she 
could not lie down at night and shut her tired eyes, 
with both hands under her cheek, as she always 
fell asleep, and never awake again, as she would 
love best of all to do ; she could cry out, but she 
could not hear the answer, “Oh, please tell me 
when I meant to be so good, why it had to be so 
hard.” 

No; she had to live in a world where people 
would laugh at her if they only knew; how she 
would shiver and freeze if her mother should once 
begin to harp upon the sudden break. She could 
not bemoan herself all the time ; she was compelled 
to live because she had been born, and she was com- 
pelled to thrive and grow cheery ; there were even 
moments when she forgot to be ashamed, for her 
mother’s winter cough set in with the cold winds, 
and beside being nurse, she was in reality the head 
of the small household. Dinah was preparing to 
be graduated in the summer and was no help at 
all ; instead, an hour or two every evening Tessa was 
asked to study with her, for she did not love study 
and was not quick like her sister. 


30 


TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 


And then she had her own special work to do, for 
she was a scribbler in prose and rhyme ; the half 
dozen weeklies that came to the house contained 
more than once or twice during the year sprightly 
or pathetic articles under the initials T. L. W. 

But few knew of this her “literary streak,” as her 
mother styled it, for she dreaded any publicity. 

Miss Jewett, her father, and Mr. Hammerton were 
her sole encouragers and advisers ; Mr. Towne was 
not aware that she dipped her pen in ink for any 
one’s pleasure but his own. Beside this work there 
were friends to entertain, half the girldom in Dun- 
ellen were her friends or had been at some time. 

Kalph Towne often wondered how she was “tak- 
ing” it; he could have found no sign of it in her 
face or in her life. Her father feared that she was 
being overworked. Mr. Hammerton’s short-sighted 
eyes noticed a shadow flit across her eyes, some- 
times, when she was talking to him, and said to 
himself, “ I see her often ; I see a change that is not 
a change; there is something happening that no 
one knows.” 


III. 


THE LAST NIGHT OF THE OLD YEAR. 

All her life she had longed for personal beauty ; 
she loved every beautiful thing and she wanted to 
love her own face. It was Ralph Towne’s perfect 
face that had drawn her to him, his voice, and his 
eyes, like the woods in October. 

She had studied her face times enough by lamp- 
light and sunlight to know it thoroughly, but she 
could not discover the sweetness that Miss Jewett 
saw, or the intelligence that delighted her father ; 
she could find without much searching the freckles 
on her nose, the shortness of her upper lip, the two 
slight marks that infantile chicken-pox had dented 
into her forehead, the upward tendency of her nose, 
and the dimple that was only half a dimple in her 
chin. 

She was as pretty and as homely as any of the 
fair, blue-eyed girls in Dunellen or elsewhere : with 
lips that shaped themselves with every passing feel- 
ing ; with eyes that could grow so bright and dark 
that one could forget how bright they were ; with 
the palest of chestnut hair, worn high or low, as 
the little world of Dunellen demanded ; with hands 


'' ' n 


32 


TESSA WADSWORTH^ S DISCIPLINE. 


slight and characteristic ; a figure neither tall nor 
slender, but perfectly proportioned, rounded and 
graceful ; arrayed as neatly and becomingly as she 
could be on her limited allowance, usually in plain 
colors, often in black of a soft texture with a ribbon 
of some pale tint at her throat and among her braids. 
A stranger might have taken her for any one of the 
twenty-three girls in Miss Jewett’s Bible class; that 
is any one of the blue-eyed ones who wore gray 
vails and gray walking suits. 

But you and I know better. 

With her self-depreciation she was one thing that 
she was not likely to guess — the prettiest talker in 
the world. 

Felix Harrison had told Miss Jewett so years 
ago. 

“ I haven’t any accomplishments,” she often 
sighed. 

“You do not need any,” Mr. Hammerton had 
once said. 

One morning in December she chanced upon a 
bundle of old letters in one of Dinah’s drawers, 
they were written during the winter that she had 
spent in the city two years ago. 

She drew one from its envelope; it was dated 
December 22, just two years ago to-day; she ran 
through it eagerly. How often she had remem- 
bered that day as an era ; the beginning of the best 
things in her uneventful life ! The second perusal 
was more slow. “I have seen somebody new; he 
is a friend of Aunt Dinah’s, or his mother is, oi 


LAST NIGHT OF THE OLD YEAR. 


33 


was. Don’t you remember that handsome house 
near Mayfield, just above Laura’s? When they 
were building it, Laura and 1 used to speculate as 
to whom it belonged, and wonder if it would make 
any difierence to us. She said she would marry 
the son (for of course there would be a handsome 
and learned son) and that I should come to live 
with her forever; and Felix said that he would 
buy it for me, some day; you and I used to play 
that we owned it but that we preferred to live 
nearer Dunellen and had left it in charge of our 
housekeeper ! How often when the former owner 
was in Europe, I have stood outside the gates and 
peered in and planned how happy we would all 
be there. Father should rest and read, and enjoy 
all the beautiful walks and the woods and the 
streams in the meadow with the rustic bridge, and 
mother should have a coach and four, and you and 
Gus and I would have it all. 

“ All this preamble is to introduce the fact that 
the somebody new is the owner of Old Place. Isn’t 
that an odd name ? I don’t like it ; I should call it 
Maplewood; in the autumn it is nothing but one 
glory of maple. His mother named it and they 
have become accustomed to its queerness. His 
mother is wintering with a relative, an invalid, I 
believe ; I think that she has taken the invalid to 
Florida and. the son (the father died long ago) has 
come to spend the winter in the city. They say 
he is wise and learned (I do not see any evidence 
of it, however), but he certainly is a veritable Tawwo 
3 


84 


TESSA WADSWORTH'S DISCIPLINE. 


Chikwo, the beauty of the world. Get out my old 
Lavengro and read about him. 

“ He is almost as dark as a gypsy, too, his eyes are 
the brownest and sunniest. I never saw such eyes 
(a sunbeam was lost one day and crept into his eyes 
for a home), his hair, beard, and mustache are as 
brown as his eyes ; as brown, but not at all bright. 

“He looks like a big boy, but Aunt Dinah says 
that he is in the neighborhood of thirty; his life 
has left no trace in his face, or perhaps all that 
brown hair covers the traces of discipline. His 
manner is gentleness and dignity united; But he 
can’t talk. Or perhaps he won’t. 

“ His replies (he ventures nothing else) are simple, 
good, kind, and above all, sincere. I have a feeling 
that I shall believe every word he says. That is 
something new for me, too. He doesn’t think 
much of me. He likes to hear me talk though ; 1 
have made several bright remarks for the pleasure 
of the sunbeam in his eyes. 

“ If I were his mother I should be sorry to do or 
say any thing to frighten it away. 

“ I know that he has never been in love ; he 
could not be such a dear, grave, humorous, gen- 
tle, dignified, stupid big boy if some girl had sha- 
ken him up. 

“ If he were the talker that Gus Hammerton is, I 
should go into raptures over him. He is a doctor, 
too, but he has not begun practice; he has been 
travelling with his mother. Is it not lovely to be 
rich enough to do just what you like ? 


LAST NIGHT OF THE OLD YEAR. 


35 


“ Tell Gus that I will answer his letter sometime; 
yon may let him read this if you like.” 

This letter she tore into atoms; she glanced over 
the others to find Kalph Towne’s name; not once 
did she find it. 

“ I will do something to commemorate this an- 
niversary,” she thought. “ I will drop his photo- 
graph into the fire, and tear the fiy-leaf out of the 
Mrs. Browning he gave me.” 

Her name and his initials were all that was 
written in the book; very carefully she cut out 
the entire page. 

“ Why, child ! have you seen a ghost ? ” her 
mother exclaimed, meeting her in the hall. 

“Yes, but it was only a ghost; there was noth- 
ing real about it.” 

That afternoon, having some sewing to do for 
her father, she betook herself to the chilliness of 
the parlor grate; her mother was in a fault-find 
frame of mind and Tessa’s nerves were ready to be 
set on edge at the least provocation. 

That parlor! She would have wept over its 
shabbiness had she ever been able to find tears for 
such purposes. Wheeling an arm-chair near enough 
to the grate to be made comfortable by all the heat 
there was, she placed her feet on the fender and 
folded her hands over the work in her lap. It was 
a raw day, the sky over Mr. Bird’s house was un- 
sympathetic, the bare branches in the apple or- 
chard stretched out in all directions stiff and dry 
as if they were never to become green again ; the 


36 


TESSA WADSWORTH'S DISCIPLINE. 


outlook was not cheering, the inlook was little 
more so; but how could she wish for any thing 
more than her father was able to give his three 
dear girls ! 

This room had seemed pretty to her in the sum- 
mer when the windows were open and she could 
have flowers everywhere ; Ralph Towne always 
spoke of her flowers, and he had more than once 
leaned back in that worn green arm-chair opposite 
hers, as if that stifi*, low room were the place of all 
places that he loved to be in. In dreary contrast 
with his own home, how poor and tasteless this 
home must be ! How the carpet must stare up at 
him with its bunches of flowers and leaves upon 
its faded gray ground ; how plain the white shades 
must appear after curtains of real lace ; how worn 
and yellowish the green rep of the black-walnut 
furniture; how few the books in the small book- 
case; and the photographs and engravings upon 
the walls, how they must shock him ! How meagre 
and coarse her dress must be to him after his moth- 
er’s rich attire ! 

She despised herself for pitying herself I 

Sue Greyson said that Old Place was fairy-land, 
but in her catalogue of its attractions she had omit- 
ted the spacious library; his “den,” Mr. Towne 
called it. In Tessa’s imagination he was ever in 
that room buried among its treasures. 

Washer photograph in that room? What had 
he done with it? Where was he keeping it? How 
he had coaxed for it ! She had had it taken unwil- 


LAST NIGHT OF THE OLD YEAR. 


37 


lingly ; it was altogether too much like giving her- 
self away ; but when she could refuse no longer she 
had given it to him. A vignette with all herself 
in it ; too much of herself for him to understand ; 
what would he do with it now ? Burn it, perhaps, 
as she had burned his ; but he would not be burn- 
ing a ghost, it was her own self, that he had thrown 
away. 

“I should have despised myself forever if I had 
not believed in him and been true,” she reasoned. 
“ I would rather trust in a lie than not believe the 
truth. And how could I know that he was not 
true!” 

She took up her work and began to sew, her rev- 
erie running on and running away with her; an 
ottoman stood near her, she had laid needlework 
and scissors upon it : how many associations there 
were clustering around it 1 It was an ugly looking 
thing, too ; her mother had worked the cover one 
winter years ago when she was kept in by a cough ; 
the wreath of roses was so unlike roses, and the 
parrot that was poised in the centre of the wreath, 
on a brown twig, was so ungainly 1 One night — 
how long ago it was! — ^before she had ever seen 
Ralph Towne, Felix Harrison had been seated upon 
it while he told her with such a warm, shy glance 
that he never slept without praying for her. And 
Ralph Towne had scattered his photographs over it, 
and asked her to choose from among them, saying, 
“ I should not have had them taken but for you.” 

The ugly old parrot was dear after all. 


38 


TESSA WADSWORTW S DISCIPLINE. 


“ I wonder,” she soliloquized, taking slow stitches, 
“if having lost faith in a person, it can ever be 
brought back again? If he should come and say 
that he has been wrong — ” 

The gate clicked, in an instant she was on her 
feet, had he come to confess himself in the wrong? 
Oh, how she would forgive und forget ! And trust 
him? 

The tall thin 'figure had a stoop in its shoulders, 
Kalph Towne was erect ; the overcoat was carelessly 
worn, revealing a threadbare vest and loose black 
neck-tie; it was only Dr. Lake, Dr. Greyson’s new 
partner. 

She had been drawn to him the first moment 
of their meeting. As soon as he had left after his 
first call, she had said to Dinah: “I never felt so 
towards any one before ; I shall be so sorry for him 
to go away where I can not follow him ; I want to 
put my arms around him and coax him to be good.” 

“ How do you know that he isn’t good ? ” 

“ I do know it. I do not know how I know. He 
hasn’t any ‘ women folks ’ either. He is as sensitive 
to every change in one’s voice as the thermometer 
is to changes in the atmosphere. I never saw any 
one like him before. When I make a collection of 
curiosities I find in Human Nature, I shall certainly 
take him for one of the rarest and most interesting. 
It would not take two minutes to convert him from 
the inquisitor to the martyi* at the stake. I feel 
as if he were a little child crying with a thorn in 
his finger, and he had no mother to take it out.” 


LAST NIGHT OF THE OLD YEAR. 


39 


“ He was only here fifteen minutes and he was as 
full of fun as he could be ; he ran down the piazza, 
and he whistled while he was unhitching his horse, 
and began to sing as he drove off. Oh, you are so 
funny ! you hear a man talk slang — he is equal to 
Sue Greyson for that — ask mother about her cough, 
tell a funny story, and then think his heart is 
breaking with a thorn in his finger.” 

Tessa would not laugh. “ I want him to stay ; 
I don’t want ever to lose him.” 

“ Isn’t he ugly ? Such a tall, square forehead. 
Did you ever see such a forehead ? ” 

“ My first thought of him was, ‘ oh, how homely 
you are.’ ” 

But that first thought never recurred ; she was 
too much attracted by his rapid, easy utterance 
and sensitive voice to remember his plain face and 
careless attire. 

She resumed her sewing with a new train of 
thought and had forgotten Dr. Lake’s entrance, 
when Bridget came to the door with a request 
from Mrs Wadsworth; opening the door of the 
sitting-room, she found her mother leaning back 
in her sewing chair with a plaintive and childish 
expression, and Dr. Lake playing with her spools 
of silk, sitting in a careless attitude of perfect 
grace at her side. Tessa was sorry to have the 
picture spoiled by his rising to greet her. 

“Kalph Towne, M.D.,” he was replying, “he was 
born with a gold spoon in his pretty mouth ! It 
would have been better for him if it had been 


40 TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 

silver-plated like mine. Quit ? He’s a mummy, a 
cloister, a tomb I I do not quarrel with any man’s 
calling,” he continued, wdnding the black silk 
around his fingers, “ circumstances have made me 
a physician. Calling! It means something only 
when circumstances have nothing to do with it.” 

“ Kead the lives of the world’s best workers,” 
said Tessa. 

“A glass of water, an empty glass, and a spoon, 
if you please. Miss Tessa. Do you remember — I 
have forgotten his name — ^but I assure you that I 
am not concocting the story — he rose to eminence 
in the medical profession, several rounds higher 
in the ladder of fame than I expect to climb — and 
his mind was drawn towards medicine when he 
was a youngster by the display of gold lace that 
his father’s physician flung into the eyes of the 
world. Gold lace made that boy a famous doctor.” 
Tessa brought the glasses and the water; in a lei- 
surely manner he counted a certain number of 
spoonfuls of water into the empty glass. “ I’m a 
commonplace fellow I I’m not one of the world’s 
workers 1 Neither is Kalph Towne 1 To have an 
easy life and not do much harm is the most I hope 
for in this world ; as for the next, who knows any 
thing about that? I say, ‘Your tongue, please,’ 
and drop medicine and make powders all day 
long for my bread and butter. I have no faith 
in medicine.” 

“ Then you are an impostor 1 You shall never 
see even the tip of my tongue.” 


LAST NIGHT OF THE OLD YEAR. 


41 


He laughed as if it were such fun to laugh. 

“ What is medicine to you ? ” he asked after 
counting forty drops from a vial into the water. 
“ A woman in a crowd once touched the border of 
a certain garment and through faith was healed ; 
so I take the thing that He has ordained for heal- 
ing, all created things are His garment; through 
His garment I come nearer to Him and am healed.” 

Mrs. Wadsworth looked annoyed. “ So I may 
take cream instead of cod liver oil, doctor.” 

“ If you prefer it,” he answered carelessly. Miss 

Tessa, you are a Mystic.” 

Tessa liked to watch the motion of his fingers ; 
his hands were small, shapely, and every move- 
ment of them struck her as an apt quotation. She 
was learning as much of himself from his hands 
as from his face. 

“ Now I must go and scold Felix Harrison,” he 
said rising. “ A teaspoonful in a wineglass of 
water three times a day, Mrs. Wadsworth! He 
had an attack last night and cheated me out of 
my dreams. Do you know him. Mystic? If he 
do not leave off brain work he will make a fool 
of himself A gold spoon would not have hurt 
him.” 

He turned suddenly facing Tessa as they stood 
alone in the hall ; he was seriousness itself now ; a 
look of care had settled over his features. He was 
not a “big boy,” he was a man, undisciplined, it 
is true, but a man to whom life meant many dis- 
appointments and hard work. 


42 TESSA tVADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 

“ What is the matter with you ? Do you ever 
go to sleep ? If you do not give up thinking and 
take to nonsense and novels, I shall be called to 
take you through a nervous fever. Mind, I am 
in earnest. Don’t spend too much time in wash- 
ing the disciples’ feet either ; it is very charming to 
be St. Theresa, but you are not strong enough.” 

“ Thank you. ‘ I am well. Is Sue at home ? ” 

“ No, she stays at Old Place until her knight 
departs. He had better go soon or I shall meet 
him in the woods. Alone. At midnight. What 
is he trifling with her for? Does he intend to 
marry her?” 

Was this his thorn? Could he love a shallow 
girl like Sue Greyson ? 

“ Ought we to talk about her ? ” she asked 
gently. 

“You are her friend. You are older than she 
is. She will not listen to me. Her father takes 
no more care of her than he does of you.” 

“ She has not cared for me lately.” 

“ She does care for you. You must pull her 
through this. Towne made a fool of a girl I know 
— she is married, though; it didn’t smash her af- 
fections very deep ; married rich, too. But it will 
be a pity for Sue to have a heart-ache all for nix; 
she is a guileless piece ; I would be sorry for her to 
have a disappointment.” 

“ Motherless children are always taken care of,” 
she answered trying to speak lightly. 

In the twilight she sat aloniB at the parlor grate; 


LAST NIGHT OF THE OLD YEAR. 


43 


it was beginning to rain; through the mist the 
lights in kitchen and parlor opposite were gleam- 
ing; Dinah and Bridget were laughing in the 
basement; a quick, hard cough, then her father’s 
voice in a concerned tone sounded through the 
stillness. 

Why was she feeling lonely and as if her heart 
would break, unless somebody should come, or un- 
less somebody gave her something, or unless some- 
thing happened? In story-books, when one was 
in such a mood, in a misty twilight something 
always happened. 

Why were there not such strong helpers in her 
life as women in books always found ? Compared 
with the grand, good, winning lover in books, what 
were the men she knew ? Why, Dr. Lake was friv- 
olous, Felix Harrison weak, Gus Hammerton prac- 
tical and pedantic, and Mr. Towne heartless and 
stupid ! 

“ Gus is here,” said Dinah, her head appearing 
at the door, “and he has brought you a book! 
But I’m going to read it first.” 

“Well, I’ll come,” she answered. But she did 
not go for half an hour ; Mr. Hammerton took the 
new book to her immediately and talked to her 
until her pale cheeks were in a glow. 

The last day of the year, what a day it was I 

It was like a mellow day in October; in the 
afternoon Tessa found herself wandering through 
Mayfield; as she sauntered past the school-house a 
voice arrested her, one of the voices that she knew 


44 


TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 


best in the world. She stood near the entrance 
listening. 

That thrilling pathetic voice ; it had never touched 
her as it touched her to-day. 

“Old year, you shall not die; 

We did so laugh and cry with you, 

I’ve half a mind to die with you, 

Old year, if you must die.” 

She stood but a moment, the voice read on, but 
she did not care to listen ; she went on at a slow 
pace, enjoying each step of the way past the bar- 
ren fields lying warm and brown in the sunlight, 
past the farm-houses, past the low-eaved home- 
stead of the Harrisons, past the iron gates of the 
Old Place with the voice in her ears and the sigh 
for the old year in her heart. She almost wished 
that she could love Felix Harrison; she had refused 
him five times since her seventeenth birthday and 
in May she would be twenty-five ! He had said 
that he would never ask her again. Why should 
she wish for any change to come into her life? 
If she might always live in the present, she would 
be content; she had her father and mother and 
Dine and Gus ; her world was broad enough. 

The sound of wheels had been pursuing her; 
a sudden stoppage, then another voice that she 
knew called to her, “Miss Tessa, will you ride 
with me?” 

“Perhaps you are not going my way,” she said 
lightly. 


LAST NIGHT OF THE OLD YEAR. 


45 


“I am going to Dunellen.” He answered her 
words only. 

As soon as they were seated in the carriage, she 
said very gravely, “ I wrote you a letter last night, 
but I burned it this morning.” 

“ I am sorry for that.” 

The words came out with a gasp and a jerk ; she 
did not know that words could choke like that, but 
she was glad as soon as she had spoken. “Mr. 
Towne, are you engaged to Sue Greysofi ? ” 

“ Engaged ! And to Sue Greyson ! ” 

“I did not ask to be saucy — I did not believe 
it — ^but don’t be heartless — don’t be cruel — don’t be 
stupid, do think about her, and don’t let her die of 
shame.” 

“ Excuse me. Miss Tessa. Why should you talk 
to me about Sue Greyson ? ” 

“ I knew that you would not understand.” 

“ Perhaps you can explain.” 

“ I can’t explain ; you ought to know.” 

“ What ought I to know ? ” he queried, looking 
down at her with the sunshine in his eyes. 

“ It seems mean in me to tell you such a thing, 
but I do not know of any other way for your sake 
and hers. I would do any thing to keep you from 
doing a heartless thing.” — Another heartless thing, 
she almost said. — “ I would do any thing for Sue, 
as I would for Dine if she had been led into trust- 
ing in a lie.” 

His face became perplexed, uncomprehending. 

“Are you trying to tell me that Sue Greyson 


46 


TESSA WADSWORTH'S DISCIPLINE, 


thinks that I am intending to marry her and that 
I have given her an occasion to believe it? You 
are warning me against trifling with Sue ? ” 

“Yes.” 

“ How do you know that she thinks so ? ” 

“Nonsense ! How do I know any thing? ” 

“I should as soon have thought — ” he ended 
with a laugh. 

“ A woman’s heart is not made of grains of sand 
to be blown hither and thither by a man’s breath,” 
she said very earnestly. 

“ Miss Tessa, you accuse me wrongfully. I have 
been kind to Sue — I have intended to be kind. 
Her life at home is too quiet for her, she has few 
friends and no education; you call me heartless. 
I thought that I was most brotherly and thought- 
ful.” 

His sincerity almost reassured her. Had she 
misjudged him? 

“ I beg your pardon,” she said, after an uncom- 
fortable pause. “ I did not know that Old Place 
was a monastery and that you were a monk. If 
you are speaking sincerely, you are the most stupid 
human being that ever breathed; if you are not 
sincere, you are too wily for me to understand.” 

The color rose to his forehead, but he was silent. 

“Mr. Towne! Excuse me. I am apt to speak 
too strongly; but I care so much for Sue. She is 
only a child in her experiences; she has no fore- 
thought, she trusts every body, and she thinks that 
you are so good and wonderful. She does not un- 


LAST NIGHT OF THE OLD YEAR. 


47 


derstand any thin^ but sincerity. Will you think 
about her?” 

“ I will.” 

She was almost frightened, was he angry? 

“Are you angry with me?” she asked, laying 
her hand on his arm. “You can not misinterpret 
me; I don’t want Sue to be hurt, and I do not 
want you to be capable of hurting her.” 

“ I understand you. Miss Tessa.” 

He spoke gently ; her heart was at rest again. 

“You say that you can not understand whether 
I am wily or sincere? ” 

“ I can not understand.” 

“Neither can I. But I thirik that I am sincere!” 

“And please be careful how you change your at- 
titude towards her ; you are unconventional enough 
to refuse a woman upon the slightest pretext. I 
know that you will say ‘ I regret exceedingly. Miss 
Sue, that you have misinterpreted my friendly at- 
tentions.’ ” 

“ I would like to; I think many things that I do 
not speak. Miss Tessa.” 

“Your head and heart would echo a perpetual 
silence if you did not,” she laughed. “The Sphinx 
is a chatterbox compared to you.” 

As they drove up under the maple-trees before 
the low iron gate, he said, “ Has this year been a 
happy year to you ? Do you sleep well ? ” 

“Wouldn’t you like to look at my tongue and feel 
my pulse ? ” she returned in her lightest tone. 

“Will you not answer me ? ” he asked gravely. 


48 


TESSA WADSWORTH^S DISCIPLINE. 


“ This year has been the best year of my life.” 

“ So has it been my best year. This winter I 
shall decide several things pertaining to my fu- 
ture; it is my plan to practice for awhile — and 
not marry ! ” 

Were those last words for her ? Discomfited and 
wounded — oh, how wounded ! — her lips refused to 
speak. 

“ Good-by,” she said, just touching his hand. 

He turned as he was driving off and lifted his 
hat, the sunshine of his eyes fell full upon her ; her 
smile was but a pitiful effort ; what right had he to 
say such a thing to her ? 

“ I hope,” she said, as she walked up the path, 
“ that I shall never see you again.” 

“ I wish that I had never seen her,” he ejaculated, 
touching his horse with the whip. 

And thus a part of the old year died and was 
buried. 

Shaking with cold, not daring to go away by her- 
self, she irresolutely turned the knob of the sitting- 
room door; her face, she was aware, was not in a 
state to be taken before her mother’s critical eyes ; 
but her heart was so crushed, she pitied herself 
with such infinite compassion, that she longed for 
some one to speak to her kindly, to touch her as if 
they loved her ; any thing to take some of the ach- 
ing away from that place in her heart where the 
tears were frozen. 

When she needed any mothering she gave it to 
herself; with her arms around her shivering, shrink- 


LAST NIGHT OF THE OLD YEAR. 


49 


ing self, she was beseeching, “ Be brave; it’s almost 
over.” 

In the old days, the impulsive little Tessa had 
always chided herself ; the sensitive little Tessa had 
always comforted herself; the truthful, eager, castle- 
building little Tessa had always been her own ref- 
uge, shield, adviser, and best comforter. 

With more bosom friends than she knew how to 
have confidences with, with more admiring girl 
friends than she could find a place for, with more 
hearts open to her than to any one girl at school, 
Tessa the child, Tessa the maiden, and Tessa the 
woman had always lived within herself, leaned 
upon herself 

Mr. Hammerton said that she was a confutation 
of the oak and vine theory, that he had stood and 
stood to be entwined about, but that she would 
never entwine. 

In this moment, standing at the door, with her 
hand upon the knob, a ray of comfort shone into 
her heart and nestled there like a gleam of sun- 
light peering through an opening in an under- 
growth, and the ray of comfort was, that, perhaps 
Gus Hammerton would come to-night and talk to 
her in his kindly, practical, unsentimental fashion, 
sympathizing with her unspoken thoughts, and 
tender towards the feelings of whose existence he 
was unaware. 

Perhaps — but of late, did she fancy, or was it 
true ? that he was rather shy with her, and dropped 
into the chair nearest to Dinah. 


60 


TESSA WADSWORTH^S DISCIPLINE. 


Well ! she could be alone by and by and go to 
sleep ! 

So relentless was she, in that instant toward 
Kalph Towne that it would hagi^e been absolute 
relief could she have looked into his dead face : to 
see the cold lids shut down fast over the sunshiny 
eyes, to know that the stiff lips could never open 
to speak meaningless words, to touch his head and 
feel assured that, warm and soft, his fingers could 
never hold hers again. 

“Why, Tessa, you look frozen to death,” ex- 
claimed her mother. “How far did you go and 
where did you meet Mr. Towne ? ” 

“I went to Mayfield,” she closed the door and 
moved towards the gay little figure reading “The 
Story of Elizabeth ” upon the lounge. “ Mr. Towne 
overtook me after I had passed Old Place.” 

“ 0, Tessa,” cried Dinah, dropping her book, “ Dr, 
Lake was here. What a pity you were out ! He 
asked where ‘ Mystic ’ was. I made a list on the 
cover of my book of the things that he talked about. 
Just hear them. One ought to understand shorL 
hand to keep up with him. Now listen.” 

Tessa stood and listened. 

“ ‘ The Valley of the Dog, 

“ ‘ The Car of Juggernaut, ' 

“ ‘ Insanity, 

“ ‘ Intemperance, 

“ ‘ Tobacco, 

“ ‘ Slavery, 

“ ‘ Church and State, 


LAST NIGHT OF THE OLD YEAR, 


61 


“ ‘ Conceit, 

“ ‘ Surgery, 

“ ‘ The English Government, 

“ ‘ Marriage, 

“ ‘ Flirtations, 

“ ‘ Ladies as Physicians, 

“ ‘The Wicked World, 

“ ‘ A Quotation from Scott.’ 

“ And that isn’t half. I began to grow interested 
there, and forgot to write.” 

“Where did the professional call come in?” 

“ Oh, that doesn’t take a second. He watches his 
patient while he talks ! Oh, and he told two hos- 
pital stories, a story of his school life, and about 
being lost in the woods, and about a camp-meeting ! 
He is from Mississippi. Your Mr. Towne couldn’t 
say so much in ten years.” 

“He says that the disease in my lungs is not 
progressive, but that I should protect my health ! I 
ought to spend every winter in the West Indies or 
in the south of Europe ! South of Europe, indeed ! 
On your father’s business ! Now if I had married 
John Gesner I might have spent my winters in any 
part of the civilized world.” 

“WouldTyou have taken us?” asked Dinah. 

“The, future is veiled from us mercifully.” 

Dinah laughed. “ Mother, you forget about love.” 
“Xove/” exclstimed Mrs. Wadsworth scornfully, 
“I should like to know what love is.” 

“Father knows,” said Dinah. “Have you read 
‘ Elizabeth,’ Tessa ? ” 


52 TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 

‘‘Yes.” 

“I’d die before I’d act as sbe did, wouldn’t you? 
I’d die before I’d let any body know that I cared 
for him more than he cared for me, wouldn’t you?” 

“It isn’t so easy to die.” 

“Did Mr. Towne speak of Sue Greyson?” in- 
quired Mrs. Wadsworth. 

“Yes.” 

“What did he say?” 

“ Nothing — much ? ” 

“He must have said something. Couldn’t you 
judge of his feelings towards her ? ” 

“ I am not a detective.” 

“ H’m,” ejaculated Mrs. Wadsworth, glancing up 
at the uneasy lips, “if he can’t talk or sing, he can 
say something.” 

“Possibly.” 

Standing alone at one of the windows in her 
chamber, she watched the sun go down the last 
night of the old year. 

In her young indignation, she had called Ealph 
Towne some harsh names; while under the fas- 
cination of his presence, she had thought that she 
did not blame him for any thing ; but standing 
alone with the happy, false old year behind her, 
and the new, empty year opening its doof into no- 
where, she cried, with a voiceless cry: “You are 
not true ; you are not sincere ; you are shallow and 
selfish.” 

At this moment, watching the same sunset, for 
he had an appreciation of pretty things, he was 


LAST NIGHT OF THE OLD YEAR. 


53 


driving homeward almost as nerve-shaken as Tessa 
herself ; according to his measure, he was regretting 
that these two trusting women were suffering be- 
cause of his — ^he did not call it selfishness — he had 
been merely thoughtless. 

Tessa’s heart could kindle and glow and burn it- 
self out into white ashes before his would feel the 
first tremor of heat ; she had prided herself upon 
being a student of human nature, but this man in 
his selfishness, his slowness, his simplicity, had baf- 
fled her. 

How could she be a student of human nature if 
she understood nothing but truth? 

She was in a bitter mood to-night, not sparing 
Kalph Towne as she would not have spared herself 
The crimson and gold faded! the gray shut down 
over her world: “How alone I shall be to live in a 
year without him I ” 

“ 0, Tessa 1 Tessa I ” cried Dinah, running up-stairs, 
“here’s Gus, and he has brought us something good 
and funny I know, for he’s so provokingly cool.” 

How could she think thoughts about the old year 
and the sunset with this practical friend down-stairs 
and a mysterious package that must mean books 1 
She had expected to cry herself to sleep ; instead 
she read Dickens with Mr. Hammerton until the 
new year was upon them. 

“Gus,” she said severely, with the volumes of 
Dickens piled in her arms up to her chin, “if I 
become matter-of-fact, practical, and commonplace 
there will be no one in the world to thank but you. 


54 TESSA WADSWORTH'S DISCIPLINE. 


I had a poem at my finger tips about the old year 
that would have forever shattered the fame of Ten- 
nyson and Longfellow.” 

“As we have lost it, we’ll be content with them,” 
he said. “Drop your books and let us read them.” 

Before the dawn she was dreaming and weep- 
ing in her sleep, for a voice was repeating, not the 
voice in the school-house, nor the voice that had 
read Longfellow, but the voice that had spoken 
the cold good-by at the gate : 

“The leaves are falling, falling, 

Solemnly and slow; 

Caw ! caw ! the rooks are calling, 

It is a sound of woe, 

A sound of woe ! ” 


IV. 


SOMEBODY NEW. 

There was the faintest streak of sunshine on the 
dying verbenas in her garden; the dead leaves, 
twigs, and sprays looked as if some one who did 
not care had trampled on them. She was glad 
that the plants were in, that there was a warm 
place for them somewhere. 

The school children were jostling against each 
other on the planks, on the opposite side of the 
street, laughing and shouting. Nellie Bird was 
provokingly chanting: 

“Freddie’s mad, 

And I am glad, 

And I know what will please him.” 

and there were two little girls in red riding hoods, 
plaid cloaks, and gay stockings, skipping along 
with their hands joined. /It was a hard world for 
little girls to grow up in. She had run along the 
planks from school once, not so very long ago, 
swinging her lunch-basket and teasing Felix Har- 
rison just as at this minute Nellie Bird was teas- 
ing Freddie Stone. 


56 


TESSA WADSWORTH'S DISCIPLINE. 


Her needle was taking exquisite stitches; Dinah 
liked white aprons for school wear, and this was 
the last of the dainty half-dozen. Her mother’s 
voice and step broke in upon her reverie. 

“Tessa, I wouldn’t have believed it, but six of 
my cans of tomatoes have all sizzled up ! Not one 
was last year, though. Mrs. Bird never has such 
good luck with hers as we have with ours.” 

“That’s too bad. But we have so many that we 
sha’n’t miss them.” 

“That isn’t the question. I remember how my 
side ached that day. Bridget was so stupid and 
you and Dine had gone up to West Point with 
Gus; he always is coming and taking you and 
Dine off somewhere ! You are not attending to a 
word I say.” 

“Yes, I am; I am thinking how you took us all 
three to look at your cans of tomatoes.” 

“ But you don’t care about the tomatoes. You 
never do take an interest in house-work. I would 
rather have Sue Greyson’s skin stuffed with straw 
than to have you around the house. And she is 
going to marry Kalph Towne: she passed with 
him this morning ; they were in the phaeton with 
that pair of little grays ! And Sue was driving ! 
I believe that you have taken cold in some way, 
you must see the doctor the next time he comes ; 
your face is the color of chalk, and your eyes are 
as big as saucers with dark rims under them ! You 
sat here writing altogether too late last night.” 

“It was only eleven when I went up-stairs.” 


SOMEBODY NEW. 


67 


“That was just an hour too late. What good 
does your writing do you or any body, I’d like to 
know.” 

“It is rather too early in my life to judge.” 

“Your father spoils you about writing; I suppose 
that he thinks you are a feather in his cap ; I tell 
him that you are none of my bringing up.” 

“I am not ‘up’ yet, perhaps.” 

“You may as well drop that work and take a run 
into Dunellen; the air will do you good. You had 
color enough in the summer. I want a spool of red 
silk, two pieces of crimson dress braid, and a spool of 
fifty cotton. Don’t get scarlet braid, I want crim- 
son ; and run into the library and get me something 
exciting; you might have known better than to 
bring me that volume of essays ! ” 

She folded the apron and laid it on the pile in the 
willow work-basket, wrapped herself in a bright 
shawl, covered her braids with a brown velvet hat, 
and started for her walk, drawing on her gloves as 
she went down the path. 

Her mother stood at the window watching her. 
“ She is too deep for me,” she soliloquized; “there is 
more in her than I shall ever make out. She is so 
full of nonsense that I expect she has refused Ealph 
Towne, and what for, I can’t see — ^there’s no one else 
in the way.” 

In Tessa’s pocket was a long and wide envelope 
containing the article that she had sat up last night 
to write ; the lessons gathered from her old year she 
had told in her simple, quaint, forcible style. The 


68 


TESSA WADSWORTH'S DISCIPLINE. 


title was as simple as the article: “Making Mis- 
takes.” 

“Tessa, you are not brilliant,” Miss Jewett had 
once remarked, “but you do go right to the 
spot.” 

The fresh air tinged her cheeks, she breathed 
more freely away from her work and her reveries ; 
there was life and light somewhere, she need not 
suffocate in the dark. 

It was not a long walk into the little city of Dun- 
ellen ; fifteen minutes of brisk stepping along the 
planks brought her to the corner that turned into 
the broad, paved, maple-lined street. As she turned 
the corner, a lame child in a calico dress and torn 
hood staggered past her bent with the weight of a 
heavy basket. She stopped and would have spo- 
ken, but the shy eyes were not encouraging. 

Two years ago all the world might have knocked 
at her gate and she would not have heard. 

“ Will you ride ? ” She lifted her eyes, with their 
color deepening, to find Mr. Towne sitting alone 
in his carriage looking down at her. 

“You are going the wrong way.” 

“Because I am not going your Way?” he asked 
somewhat sternly. 

“ I thought that you had gone away,” she said 
uncomfortably. 

“We go on the seventeenth.” 

“You have not told me where?” 

“Have I not? You have forgotten. Sue will 
stay at home and learn to be sensible.” 


SOMEBODY NEW. 


59 


“ I don’t like you when you speak in that tone.” 

“Then I will never do it again.” 

“ Good-by,” she said cheerily, passing on. 

His thoughts ran on — “ How bright she is ! She 
has a sweet heart, if ever a woman had ! I wonder 
if I am letting slip through my fingers one of the 
opportunities that come to a man but once in a life- 
time ! A year or two hence will do ; she cares too 
much to forget me.” 

Her thoughts ran on — “How can you look so 
good and so handsome and not be true ! ” 

With a quickened step she crossed the Park. Miss 
Jewett’s large fancy store was opposite the Park. 

Miss Jewett was never too tired or too busy to 
live again her young life. Sue Greyson was sure 
that she had broken somebody’s heart, else she never 
was so eloquent in warning her about Stacey Eheid. 
Laura Harrison had decided that she had once lived 
in constant dread of having a step-mother. Mary 
Sherwood wondered if she had ever been a busy- 
body, and in that experience had learned to warn 
her to keep quiet her busy tongue; and Tessa 
Wadsworth knew that she must have learned her 
one word of advice: “Wait,” through years that 
she would not talk about. 

Miss Jewett was seldom alone; Tessa was glad 
to find the clerks absent and no one bending over 
the counter but Sue Greyson. 

“0, Tessa,” she cried in her loud, laughing voice. 
“ I haven’t seen you in an age.” 

Miss Jewett’s greeting was a hand-clasp; among 


60 TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 

all her girls (and all the girls in Dunellen were 
hers) Tessa Wadsworth was the elected one. 

“ Mrs. Towne has every thing so delicious,” Sue 
was rattling on; “such perfumes and such silks and 
such jewels. Oh, how Old Place makes my mouth 
water ! I wish you could go over the place, Tessa ; 
you were never even through the grounds, were 
you? Mr. Kalph takes great pride in keeping it 
nice; of course, it is really his. I’d marry any 
body to live there and have plenty of money and 
do just as I please ; not that Mr. Kalph isn’t some- 
thing out of the common, though. People say 
that he never means any thing by his attentions ; 
Dr. Lake says — ” 

“ I hear that you are going to St. Louis,” inter- 
rupted Miss Jewett. 

“ No, I’m not. And I’m as provoked as I can be 
and live ! Something has happened ; Mr. Ralph is 
an uneasy mortal; he never knows what he will 
do next, and he has changed his mind about tak- 
ing me. My cake is all dough about my winter’s 
fun. How I cried the night she told me! The 
last night of the year, too, when I ought to have 
been full of fun. Mrs. Towne wants me to write 
to her, but I’d never dare, unless you would help 
me, Tessa, about the spelling and punctuation. 
Mr. Ralph would laugh until he died over my 
letters. 

“I don’t write to Stacey now. Miss Jewett. I 
wrote him a letter one Sunday from Old Place and 
told him that he might as well ^ase. Mr. Ralph 


SOMEBODY NEW. 


61 


and I had been walking through the wood and he 
asked me if I were engaged to Stacey ! I thought 
it was about time to stop that.” 

“Perhaps if you had been home you wouldn’t 
have written that letter. Stacey is a fine fellow.” 

“ Oh, I had thought of it, but that day I decided 1 
Stacey can hardly support one, let alone two. Fa- 
ther says that I was born to have a rich husband 
because I have such luxurious tastes ! I know that 
I shall die cooped up at home. I have to go out 
to see the sons and daughters of the land. Tessa, 
I don’t see how you live.” 

“I do, nevertheless,” said Tessa, selecting her 
spool of silk. 

“ I shall have Dr. Lake this winter or I couldn’t 
exist. He says that he will take me everywhere if 
father will only give him the time. He is great fun, 
only he does get so moody and serious ; sits for two 
hours in the office with his head in his hands. Mr. 
Kalph doesn’t have moods ; he is always pleasant. 
I am going to stay these last few days at Old Place. 
Tessa, I am coming to stay all night with you and 
have a long talk.” 

“ I shall be very glad; I have been wishing that 
you would.” 

“ Oh, I’ll come. I have a whole budget to tell 
you.” 

“ Sue, you look thin,” said Miss Jewett, rolling 
up her purchases. 

“ I am thin. Since the night before New Years, 
I have lost three nounds.” 


62 


T£SSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 


The night before New Years ! Tessa’s veil shaded 
her face falling between her and Sue. 

“ Mr. Kalph lectured me ; oh, how he talked ! 
When he will, he will, that’s the truth. His 
mother says that her will is nothing compared 
to his, and I believe it.” Sue’s face grew troubled. 
“ He told me that I ought to read travels and his- 
tories, and throw away novels; that I ought to 
marry Stacey, if he is a good man and can take 
care of me — ” Her voice sounded as if she were 
crying ; she laughed instead and ran olf. 

“ Something at Old Place has hurt Sue ; I didn’t 
like the idea of Mrs. Towne taking her up; Mr. 
Towne — I do not know about him! Do you?” 

“No.” 

“Ah, here comes Sarah I Kachel has a sore throat, 
and Mary has gone to the city to buy to-day. Light 
the gas, Sarah.” 

The light flashed over the faces: Miss Jewett’s 
almost as fair as a child’s, and sweeter than any 
child’s that Tessa had ever seen, with a mouth 
in the lines of which her whole history was writ- 
ten, with just a suspicion of dimples in the tinted 
cheeks, with brown rings of soft hair touching 
the smooth forehead; the younger face was hur- 
ried, anxious, with a trembling of the lips, and a 
nervous gleam in the eyes that were so dark, to- 
night, that they might have been mistaken for 
hazel. 

The door was pushed open ; a crowd of girls gig- 
gled in ; Tessa bowed to Mary Sherwood and moved 


SOMEBODY NEW. 


63 


aside. She was turning over a pile of wools, se- 
lecting colors for a sacque for Dinah, when a laugh 
from the group thrilled her ; low, deep, full, in all 
her life she had never heard a sound like it. 

It was as sweet as the note of a thrush and as 
jubilant as a thoughtless girl. 

“Now, Naughty Nan, you are laughing at me. 
But I will forgive you, because you are going 
away so soon. When are you coming back?” 

“Never. I will allure the black bear to take me 
around the world.” 

Naughty Nan stepped back, tossing her curls 
away from her face ; Tessa looked down into her 
face, for she was a little thing; it was not a re- 
markable face: a broad forehead, deep set brown 
eyes, a passable complexion, a saucy mouth. If 
she would only laugh again; but she would not 
even speak. 

How surprised Tessa would have been had she 
known that Naughty Nan had been studying her 
and wishing, “ I want to be like you.” 

The group of girls giggled out. 

“ I have fallen in love,” said Tessa. 

“With Nan Gerard? Every body does. She is 
one of those lovable little creatures that every body 
spoils ! It’s strange that you haven’t met her ; she 
is Mary Sherwood’s cousin.” 

“I do remember now — Mr. Hammerton told me 
that I must hear her laugh.” 

“Her home is in St. Louis; she had never been 
in Dunellen until a month since ; she was her fa- 


64 


TESSA WADSWORTH^S DISCIPLINE. 


ther’s pet and lived abroad with him until he died 
a year ago! He named her Naughty Nan. She 
has plenty of money and plenty of lovers I She 
is going home under the escort of Mr. Towne 
and his mother. Perhaps it is her laugh that has 
stolen his heart from Sue I Naughty Nan was to be 
married, but the gentleman died in consumption.” 

“And she can laugh as lightly as that! If my 
father should die I would never laugh again.” 


V. 

HEARTS THAT WERE WAITING. 

On the evening of the eighteenth of January, 
Tessa was sitting alone in her chamber, wrapped 
in her shawl, writing. She was keeping a secret, 
for she was writing a book and no one knew it but 
Mr. Hammerton ; he would not have known it had 
not several questions arisen to which she could find 
no answer. 

“I can not do without my encyclopedia,” she 
had said. 

She had written the title lovingly — “ Under the 
Wings.” 

This chamber was her sanctuary ; she was born 
in this room, she had lived in it ever since ; her lit- 
tle battles had been fought on this consecrated 
ground, her angry tears, her wilful tears, and the 
few later grateful tears had fallen while kneeling 
at the side of the white-draped bed or sitting at 
the window with her head in her hands or on 
the window-sill. A stranger would have thought 
it a plain, low room with its cottage set of pale 
green and gold trimmings, its ingrain carpet of 
6 


66 


TESSA WADSIVORTH^S DISCIPLINE. 


oak leaves on a green ground, its gray paper with, 
scarlet border, and three white shades with scarlet 
tassels. 

The high mantel was piled with books, the gifts 
of her father, Mr. Hammerton, and Miss Jewett; on 
the walls were photographs in oval black-walnut 
frames of Miss Jewett, sitting at a table with her 
elbow upon it and one hand resting on a book in 
her lap, of her father and mother, she sitting and 
he standing behind her, and one of herself and Di- 
nah, taken when they were fifteen and twenty-one ; 
there were also a large photograph taken from a 
painting of the Mater Dolorosa, which Mr. Hammer- 
ton had given her on her fourteenth birthday and 
a chromo of Eed Kiding Hood that he had given 
to Dinah upon her fourteenth birthday. Upon the 
table at which she was writing, books were piled, 
and a package of old letters that she had been sort- 
ing, and choosing some to burn, among which were 
two from Felix Harrison. The package contained 
several from Mr. Hammerton, but his were never 
worth burning; they were only worth keeping be- 
cause they were so like himself. Pages of manu- 
script were scattered among the books, and a long 
envelope contained two rejected articles that she 
had planned to rewrite after a consultation with 
Mr. Hammerton and to send elsewhere. She had 
cried over her first rejected article (when she was 
eighteen), and two years afterward had revised it, 
changed the title, and her father had been proud 
of it in print. 


HEARTS THAT WERE WAITING. 


67 


She was writing and thinking of Sue when a 
noisy entrance below announced her presence. 

“Go right up,” said Mrs. Wadsworth’s voice. 
“ Tessa is star-gazing in her room. Don’t stay if 
you are chilly. Tessa likes to be cold.” 

Tessa met her at the head of the stairs. 

“I’ve come to stay all night. Do you want 
me?” 

“ I want you more than I want any one in the 
world.” 

“That’s refreshing. I wanted to see you and 
that’s why I came. Norah Bird said that Dine 
was to stay all night with her and I knew I should 
have you all to myself Dr. Lake brought me. I 
believe that he wanted me to come. What do you 
stay up here for ? It’s lovely down-stairs with your 
father and mother; she is sewing and he is reading 
to her. Put away that great pile of foolscap and 
talk to me ; I’m as full of talk as an egg is full of 
meat.” 

“Must I break the shell?” 

“Your room always looks pretty and there isn’t 
much in it, either.” 

“ Of course not, after Old Place.” 

“ Old Place is enchanting ! ” Sue to^ssed her gloves 
and hat to the bed. “I’ll keep on mysacque; I 
want to stay up here.” 

Tessa had reseated herself at the table. Sue 
dropped down on the carpet at her feet. 

“ Have they gone ? ” 

“ Oh, yes ! I stayed to see them off and drove 


68 


T£SSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 


to the depot with them. We called for Nan Gerard. 
What a flirt that girl is ! Any one would think 
that she had known Mr. Kalph all his life.” 

Sue leaned backward against Tessa ; her face was 
feverish and excited, her thin cheeks would have 
looked hollow but for their high color, her eyes as 
she raised them revealed something new; some- 
thing new and not altogether pleasant. 

Tessa touched her hair and then bent over and 
kissed her. It was so seldom that Sue was kissed. 

“You know that night — ” Sue began with an 
effort, “the night before New Years. Mr. Kalph 
found me in his den, I was arranging one of his 
tables, and he said that he wanted to talk to me. 
And I should think he dM I I didn’t know that 
he had so much tongue in his head. His mother 
calls him Ralph the Silent. Grace Geer calls him 
Kalph the Wily when nobody hears. He is Ralph 
the Hateful when he wants to be. How he went 
on ! Fury ! There ! I promised him not to talk 
slang or to use ‘ unlady-like exclamations.’ I was 
as high and mighty as he was, but I wanted to cry 
all the time. He said that I ought to live for some- 
thing, that I am not a child but a woman. And I 
promised him that I wouldn’t read novels until he 
says that I may ! He said that I didn’t know what 
trouble is ! He has had trouble, Grace Geer says. 
I don’t see how. Some girl I suppose. Perhaps 
she flirted with him. I hope she did. But I have 
had. trouble. Did he ever wait and wait and wait 
for a thing till he almost died with waiting, and 


HEARTS THAT WERE WAITING. 


69 


then find that he didn’t get it and never could? 
Did you ever feel so ? ” 

The appealing eyes were looking into hers ; she 
could not speak instantly. 

“I don’t believe that you ever did. You are 
quiet. You have a nice home and people to love 
you ; your mother and father are so proud of you ; 
your mother is always talking to people about you 
as if she couldn’t live without you ! And you don’t 
have beaux and such horrid things! I shouldn’t 
think that you would like Dine to have a lover be- 
fore you have one.” 

“ Dine ? ” said Tessa, looking perplexed. 

“Why, yes, Mn Hammerton.” 

“ Oh, I forgot him,” replied Tessa, almost laugh- 
ing. 

“I wish that I had never seen Old Place. I never 
should have thought any thing if it hadn’t been 
for Grace Geer. Before I went to Old Place I ex- 
pected to marry Stacey. She put things into my 
head. She used to call me Mrs. Kalph, and tell me 
how splendidly I could dress after I was married I 
And she used to ask me what he said to me and 
explain that it meant something. I didn’t know 
that it meant any thing. He was so old and so 
wise that I thought he could never think of me. 
Once she went home with me and she told father 
and Aunt Jane and Dr. Lake that they were going 
to lose me. He told me himself that night that he 
was more interested in me than in any body.” 

“ Did he say that ? ” asked Tessa, startled. 


70 TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 

“Yes, he did.” 

“ So am I interested in your life. I want to see 
what becomes of you.” 

“Oh, he didn’t mean that He meant in me. 
But I suppose he didn’t mean any thing, or he 
wouldn’t have told his mother not to take me to 
St. Louis. You think I like him because he’s rich 
and handsome, but I don’t. I like him because he 
was so kind to me ; nobody was ever so kind to me 
before; I can love any one who is kind to me. He 
gave me his photograph a year ago. It’s elegant. 
I’ll show it to you some time. I know he had six 
taken, for I saw them and counted them ; he didn’t 
know it, though. And I heard him tell his mother 
that he had Jive taken. I never could find out 
where that sixth one went to. I know that his 
mother had one, and Grace Geer, and Miss Sarepta 
Towne, that’s three ! And mine was four, and 
Philip Towne’s was five. I asked him where the 
other was.” 

“ What did he say?” asked Tessa, gravely. 

“He said nothing. I know that Aunt Jane 
thinks my not going the queerest thing in nature, 
and father looked rather nonplussed and asked me 
what I had been doing. I am as ashamed as I 
can be.” 

Tessa arranged her papers thoughtfully; she was 
pondering Grace Geer’s name for Mr. Towne. 

“Perhaps he will change his mind and come 
home and like me,” said Sue, brightening. 

“0, Sue, Sue, don’t make a disappointment for 


HEARTS THAT WERE WAITING. 


71 


yourself! When there are so many good and beau- 
tiful things in the world, why do you see only this 
that is being withheld ? ” 

“ Because — ” with a drooping head, “ I want it 
so.” 

“There are good men and good women in the 
world. Sue; men and women whose word is pure 
gold.” 

“ Whose, I’d like to know ? ” 

“ Miss Jewett’s.” 

“ Oh, of course I ” 

“ And Gus Hammerton’s.” 

“ Oh, he’s as wise and stupid as an owl 1 ” 

“Dr. Johnson could think in Latin and I should 
not wonder if Gus could.” 

“But he’s awkward and never talks nonsense, 
and he wears spectacles and has a tiny bald spot 
on the top of his head, the place where the wool 
ought to grow 1 The girls don’t run after him.” 

“ They are not wise enough.” 

“ He’s so old, too.” 

“He’s younger than Mr. Towne.” . 

“ He doesn’t look so. And he’s poor.” 

“ He has a good salary in the bank.” 

“ Mr. Kalph has the pure gold, but it is not in his 
word. I only wish it was. I always pray over my 
love affairs; they ought to come out all right.” 

“How do you know what ‘all right’ is?” 

“ I know what I want.” 

“ I’ll say to you what Miss Jewett always says: 

Wait:' 


72 TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE, 

“What for ? I don’t know what I’m waiting for. 
Do you ? ” 

“Yes.” 

“What? Tell me.” 

“ The tvill of God^ 

“ Oh ! ” Sue drew nearer as if she were fright- 
ened. After a while she spoke : “ I’m so sorry for 
dear Mrs. Towne. She has every thing in the 
world but the thing she wants most. She said 
one day that she would be willing to be the poor- 
est woman in Dunellen if she might have a daugh- 
ter. She said it one day after we had passed you ; 
you were alone, picking up leaves near the corner 
by the brook. ‘A daughter like that,’ she said, 
and she turned to look back at you; you were 
standing still with the leaves in your hand. Mr. 
Ralph didn’t say any thing, but he looked back, too. 
I said, ‘That’s Tessa Wadsworth.’ Mrs. Towne 
said, ‘Do you know her, Ralph?’ and he said, ‘I 
have met her several times.’ ” 

Tessa had wiped her gold pen and slipped it into 
its morocco case ; she closed her writing-desk as she 
said cheerily : “ Now about this winter, Sue ; what 
do you intend to do ? ” 

“You don’t know how horrid it is at home ! Fa- 
ther always has his pockets full of bottles and he 
doesn’t care for the things that interest me ; all he 
talks about is his ‘cases,’ and all Aunt Jane cares 
for is house- work and the murders in the newspa- 
pers; Dr. Lake is splendid, but he’s so poor and he’s 
low-spirited when he isn’t full of fun ; and when his 


HEARTS THAT WERE WAITING. 


73 


engagement with father is ended he’ll set up for 
himself, and it will take him a century to afford to 
be married.” 

“ Sue, look up at me and listen.” 

Sue looked up and listened. 

“ I pray you don’t flirt with Dr. Lake.” 

Sue laughed a conscious laugh. 

“Men flirt; they haven’t any hearts.” 

“He has. You do not know the influence for 
evil that you may become in his life.” 

Sue’s eyes grew wild, she clung to Tessa with 
both hands. “You sha’n’t talk so to me. You 
sha’n’t. You make me afraid. I’ll try to be good. 
I liM try.” 

“How will you try?” 

“ I won’t try to make him like me. I am sure 
that he would if I should try a little. I’ll tell him 
about Stacey. Tessa, I don't want to he an old maid." 

Tessa’s eyes and lips kept themselves grave. 

“ I wouldn’t think about that. I’d do good and 
be good; I’d help Aunt Jane, and go with your 
father on his long drives — ” 

“ I’d rather go with Dr. Lake.” 

“ Let your father see what a delightful daughter 
you can be. My father and I can talk for hours 
about books and places and people.” 

“Hateful! I hate books. And I don’t know 
about places and book-people.” 

“And don’t wait for Dr. Lake to come in at 
night.” 

“ I do. I made him a cup of coffee last night.” 


74 


TESSA WADSWORTH^ S DISCIPLINE. 


“Who makes coffee for your father?” 

“Oh father thought that I made it for him. But 
Dr. Lake knew ! ” 

“I will read history with, you this winter. Dine 
and I intend to study German with Gus Hammer- 
ton ; you can study with us, if you will?” 

“Ugh!” groaned Sue, “as if that were as much 
fun as getting married.” 

“It may help along. Who knows?” laughed 
Tessa. 

“I’m going to make Miss Gesner a visit next 
month. She asked me to-day. But they are such 
old men? Mr. John Gesner is an old beau! Mr. 
Lewis is lovely, so kind and polite. And Miss Ges- 
ner is charming when she doesn’t try to educate 
me. Their house is grander than Old Place and 
they keep more servants. I’ll forget all about Old 
Place before spring. Mr. John Gesner likes girls.” 

“Sue.” 

“ Well! Don’t be so solemn.” 

“ If I were to die and leave a little girl in the 
world as your mother left you, I would hope that 
some one would watch over her, and if the time 
came, through her own foolishness, or in the way 
of God’s discipline, for a disappointment to come to 
her, I would hope that this friend would love her 
as I love you to-night. She would warn her, ad- 
vise her, and encourage her! Don’t go to visit 
Miss Gesner; she is selfish to ask you; you are 
bright and lively and she likes to have you to help 
entertain her friends — but you will not be so good 


HEARTS THAT WERE WAITING. 


75 


a daughter to your father if your heart is drawn 
away from his home; the best home that he can 
. afford to give you.” 

“There’s danger at home and danger abroad,” 
laughed Sue. “ Don’t you wish that you could put 
me in a glass case ? ” 

“ I don’t know what to do with you.” 

“ Oh, something will happen to me before long, 
ril get married or die or something. I’m glad I 
had my things ready to go with the Townes, for 
now I have them ready to go to Miss Gesner’s. I 
wish I had a mother and my little brother hadn’t 
died. I’d like to have a reoH home like yours ! I 
wouldn’t mind if it were as plain as this; but I’d 
rather have it like Old Place. Won’t Nan Gerard 
have a lovely time? Such a long journey, and 
Mr. Ealph will be so attentive, and she’ll be so 
proud to be with such a handsome fellow ! Don’t 
you like to be proud of people that belong to you? 
I am always proud enough to go out with Mr. 
Ealph.” 

“There is some one else to be proud of some- 
where ! Sue, can’t you be brave ? ” 

“Somebody will have what I want,” said Sue. 
“ I can’t bear to think of that. I shall have to 
drive past Old Place in father’s chaise with one 
horse, and I hate to drive with one horse ! and see 
somebody in my place in silks and velvets and dia- 
monds and emeralds ! And she will have visitors 
from all over and Old Place will be full of good 
times and Mr. Ealph will let her do it all and be 


76 


TESSA WADSWORTH'S DISCIPLINE. 


SO kind to her! And she will be so proud and 
happy and handsome. Would you like that? You 
know you wouldn’t. Do you think that I really 
must give him up ? ” 

Sue did not see the distressed face above her; 
she felt that the fingers that touched her hair and 
forehead were loving and pitiful. 

“ Don’t talk so; don’t thinh so I Forget all about 
Old Place. Do you not remember Mrs. Towne’s 
kindness? That is a happier thing to think of 
than the grounds and the house and handsome 
furniture.” 

“ I wish I had told you about it before,” sobbed 
Sue. “You would have made it right for me; then 
I wouldn’t have thought and thought about it until 
it was real. And now I can’t believe that it isn’t 
true and the house is shut up with only Mr. and 
Mrs. Kyerson and the boy to look after things and 
Mr. Kalph gone not to come back — ever, perhaps. 
If Mrs. Towne should die, perhaps he won’t come 
back but go off and be a doctor; for he doesn’t 
want to be married, he said so ; he told his mother 
so. I don’t want him to be a doctor and have bot- 
tles in all his pockets and smell of medicine like 
father and Dr. Lake. He wouldn’t be Mr. Kalph 
any more.” 

“ So much the better for you.” 

“ Then you don’t think that he’s so grand.” 

She answered quietly, surprising herself with the 
truth that she had not dared to confess to herself, 
“ No. I do not think he is so grand.” * 


HEARTS THAT WERE WAITING. 


77 


“Who is?” 

“Who is? George Macdonald and George Eliot 
and Shakespeare and St. Paul and my father and 
your father,” laughed Tessa. 

“ Hark. They are singing over the way.” 

“ There’s a child’s party there to-night.” 

Tessa went to the window. 

Loud and merry were the voices : 

“Little Sally Waters sitting in the sun, 

Weeping and crying for a man.” 

Sue laughed. “ Oh, how that carries me back.” 

“ That’s good advice,” said Tessa, as the children 
shouted — 

“Kise, Sally, rise, and wipe off your eyes.” 

“I wish that I were a little girl over there in 
the fun,” said Sue. “ Suppose we go.” 

“ I intended to go. Perhaps we can teach them 
some new games.” 

No one among the children was merrier than 
Sue; not one any more a child. 

“I think I’ll stay little,” said Sue, coming to 
Tessa, half out of breath. “I’m never going to 
grow up; it’s hateful being a woman, isn’t it?” 

“You will never know,” said Tessa laughing. 
“There’s little Harry Sherwood calling for Sue 
Greyson now.” 

Towards midnight, when Tessa was asleep. Sue 
awakened her with, “ Put your arm around me, I 
can’t go to sleep.” 


78 


T£SSA WADSWORTH^S DISCIPLINE. 


Sue lay still not speaking or moving. 

The clock in the sitting-room struck three. 

“Tessa, Tessa,” whispered a startled voice, “are 
you awake ? ” 

“Yes,” rousing herself, “what is it? Is any 
thing the matter?” 

“Oh, no,” wearily, “but it has struck one, and 
two, and three, and I’m afraid it will strike four.” 

“ I suppose it will unless the clock stops or time 
ceases to be.” 

“ What will be when time ceases to be ? What 
comes next ? ” 

“ Forever comes next. Don’t you want it to be 
forever ? ” 

“ You sha’n’t talk so and frighten me. I can’t go 
to sleep. I thought somebody was dying or dead.” 

“You were dreaming.” Tessa put a loving arm 
around her. “ Didn’t you ever say the multiplica- 
tion table in the night ? ” 

“No, nor any other time.” 

The moonlight shone in through the open win- 
dow, making a golden track across the carpet. 

“The moon shines on Ked Hiding Hood,” said 
Sue. “ Tell me a story, Tessa.” 

“ Don’t you like the moonlight ? Some one had 
a lovely little room once and she said that the 
moonlight came in and swept it clean of foolish 
thoughts.” 

“ What else ? ” in an interested voice. 

“ It is a long story; it is in blank verse, too, and 
you like rhymes.” 


HEARTS THAT WERE WAITING. 


79 


“ I’ve been trying to say Mother Goose and Old 
Mother Hubbard.” 

“I will tell you a story,” said Tessa, as wide 
awake as if the sun were shining. “ I will rhyme 
it as I run along, and when I hesitate and can not 
make good sense and a perfect rhyme, we’ll go to 
sleep.” 

“Well, but you must do your best.” 

“I always do my best. I tell Gus and Dine 
stories in rhyme.” 

So she began with a description of a little girl 
who was fair and a boy who was brave, who grew 
up and grew together, but cruel fate in the shape 
of a step-mother separated them, and he travelled 
all over the world, and she stayed at home and 
made tatting, until a hundred years went by and 
he came to the door a wornout traveller and found 
her a withered maiden sitting alone feeding her 
cat. Afterward in trying to recall this, she only 
remembered one couplet: 

“ He was covered with snow, his hat with fur, 

He took it off and bowed to her.” 

Once or twice Sue gave a hysterical laugh. 

The story was brought to a proper and blissful 
conclusion; still Sue was sleepless. 

“ How far on their journey do you suppose they 
are now ? ” 

“I’m not a time-table.” 

Sue lay too still to be asleep ; when she was still 
she was a marvel of stillness. 


80 


TESSA WADSWORTH’S DISCIPLINE. 


Daylight and breakfast found her in high spirits, 
asking advice of Mrs. Wadsworth about making a 
wrapper out of an old brown cashmere, and talking 
to Tessa about the drive that she had promised to 
take with Dr. Lake, saying the last thing as she 
ran down the steps, “ I’ll come and study German 
if I can’t find any thing better to do.” 

In all the talks afterward. Sue never alluded to 
this night; it was the only part of her life that she 
wished Tessa to forget; she herself forgot every 
thing except that she was miserable about Mr. 
Ralph and two of the lines in the story that she 
had laughed about and called as “ stupid ” as her 
own life: 

“ The room in which she lived alone, was carpeted with matting; 

She spent the hours, she spent the days, in making yards of 
tatting.” 


f 


VI. 


ANOTHER OPPORTUNITY. 

“Miss Jewett.” 

“Well, dear.” 

Tessa was sitting on the carpet in Miss Jewett’s 
little parlor with her head in Miss Jewett’s lap; 
Miss Jewett had been smoothing the girl’s hair for 
several minutes, neither speaking. 

“I have lost something; I don’t dare try to find 
it for fear that God has taken it away from me.” 

“How did you lose it?” 

Tessa raised her head, paused, then spoke im- 
pressively: “I lost it through carefuHnessP 

“Ah! I have heard of such a thing before.” 

“Oh, have you? Is any one in the world like 
me? I thought that no one ever made such mis- 
takes as I do, or needed the discipline that I need 1 ” 

“My dear, all hearts are fashioned alike.” 

“ But all lives are not alike.” 

“Not so different as you imagine; in my girls I 
live over my old struggles, longings, mistakes; in 
the history of lives lived ages ago I find the same 
struggles, longings, mistakes, the same need of the 
same discipline.” 

6 


82 


TESSA WADSWORTH'S DISCIPLINE. 


“Oh, if you can help me; if you can only help 
me! You study the Bible, isn’t every thing in the 
Bible ? Didn’t Paul mean that every thing was in 
it when he said that through the comfort of the 
Scriptures we have hope? I can not find any 
thing to suit me; you find something.” 

The gaslight was more than she could bear, she 
dropped her head again, covering her face with 
both hands. 

“ Suppose you tell me all about it.” 

“ AU about it," repeated Tessa in a muffled tone. 
“I could not if I wanted to; but I can tell you 
where the despair comes in.” 

“Tliat is all I want to know.” 

“Well,” raising her head again and speaking 
clearly and slowly. “ It was an opportunity to get 
something that I wanted. I thought I had it, I 
thought it was laid in my hand and I had but to 
clasp my fingers tightly over it to keep it forever 
and forever ; I cared so much that I hardly cared for 
any thing else. I do not think that I would lose it 
again through caring too much. Do you think that 
it is just as hard for God to see us too careful as too 
careless ? ” 

“ How were you too careful ? ” 

“ Oh, in being wise and doing things in my own 
way. What I want to know is this : did He ever 
give any body another opportunity? If He ever 
did, I will hope that He will be just as tender 
towards me.” 

“Christ came down to earth to seek the lost; a 


ANOTHER OPPORTUNITY. 


83 


lost opportunity is one of the things that He came 
to find. I think if you seek it for His sake, and 
not for your own, that He will find it for you.” 

“For His sake, not for mine,” repeated Tessa, 
wonderingly. “How can I ever attain to that? I 
am very selfish.” 

“Do you remember about David, whose heart 
was fashioned like yours, how careful he was once 
and what happened ? ” 

Miss Jewett was speaking in her brisk, working 
voice; the troubled face had become alight. 

“ Now we will read about one who made a sorry 
mistake by being so careful that he forgot to find 
out God’s way of doing a certain thing. He did 
the thing that he wanted to do after a style of his 
own.” 

Tessa arose and went into Miss Jewett’s bed- 
room ; she knew that the Bible she loved best, the 
one pencilled and interlined, was always kept on a 
stand near the head of her bed. While Miss Jewett 
was opening it, Tessa said hurriedly and earnestly : 
“ I knew that if it were anywhere in the Bible — 
that if any one in the world had suffered like me 
— that you would know where to find them. You 
said last Sunday that God had written something 
to help us in every perplexity ; but I studied and 
studied and could not find any thing about second 
opportunities. Perhaps mine is only a foolish little 
trouble; not a grand one like David’s.” 

“Do you think that God likes to hear you say 
that?” 


84 


TESSA WADSWORTH^ S DISCIPLINE, 


“ No,” confessed Tessa. “ I will not even think 
it again.” 

“Have you forgotten how David attempted to 
bring the Ark into the city of David, and how he 
failed? What a mortifying and distressing failure 
it was, too. Now I’ll read it to you.” 

One of Tessa’s pleasures was to listen to her read- 
ing the Bible ; she read as if David lived across the 
Park, and as if the city of David were not a mile 
away. 

Tessa kept her head in its old position and lis- 
tened with intent and longing eyes. 

“‘And David consulted with the captains of 
thousands and hundreds and every leader. And 
David said unto all the congregation of Israel, If 
it seem good unto you, and that it be of the Lord 
our God, let us send abroad unto our brethren 
everywhere, that are left in all the land of Israel, 
and with them also to the priests and Levites 
which are in their cities and suburbs, that they 
may gather themselves together unto us : and let 
us bring again the Ark of our God to us : for we 
inquired not at it in the days of Saul. And all the 
congregation said that they would do so : for the 
thing was right in the eyes of all the people. So 
David gathered all Israel together from Shihor of 
Egypt even unto the entering of Hemath, to bring 
the Ark of God from Kiijath-jearim. And David 
went up and all Israel to Baalah, that is to Kir- 
jath-jearim, which belonged to Judah, to bring up 
thence the Ark of God the Lord, that dwelleth be- 


ANOTHER OPPORTUNITY. 


85 


tween the cherubim whose name is called on it. 
And they carried the Ark of God in a new cart — ’ 
In a mw cart, Tessa ; see how careful he was ! ” 

“Yes.” 

— Out of the house of Abinadab; and Uzza 
and Ahir drave the cart.’ That was all right and 
proper, wasn’t it ? ” 

“ It seems so to me.” 

“ ‘ And David and all Israel played before God 
with all their might, and with singing, and with 
harps, and with timbrels, and with cymbals, and 
with trumpets.’ They were joyful with all their 
might. Were you as joyful as that ? ” 

“Yes: fully as joyful as that.” 

“ Now see the confusion, the shame, and the fear 
that followed those harps and timbrels and trum- 
pets. ‘And when they came unto the threshing- 
floor of Chidon, Uzza put forth his hand to hold 
the Ark; for the oxen stumbled. And the anger 
of the Lord was kindled against Uzza, and He 
smote him, because he put his hand to the Ark: 
and he died before God. And David was dis- 
pleased, because the Lord had made a breach upon 
Uzza: wherefore that place is called Perez-uzza, to 
this day. And David was afraid of God that day, 
saying. How shall I bring the Ark of God home 
to me?’” 

“ I should think that he wovld have been afraid,” 
said Tessa ; “ and after he had been so sure and joy- 
ful, too.” 

Miss Jewett read on: “‘So David brought not 


86 


TESSA WADSWORTH^ S DISCIPLINE. 


the Ark home to himself to the city of David, but 
carried it aside to the house of Obed-edom the 
Gittite.’ ” 

Tessa raised her head to speak. “I can not 
understand where his mistake was; how could he 
have been too careful of such a treasure. Oh, how 
terrible and humiliating his disappointment must 
have been ! How ashamed he was before all the 
people ! I can bear any thing better than to be 
humiliated.” 

“ My poor, proud Tessa.” 

Tessa’s tears started at the tone ; these first words 
of sympathy overcame her utterly ; she dropped her 
head again and cried like a child, like the little 
child Tessa who had had so many fits of crying. 

The eyes above her were as wet as her own; 
once or twice warm lips touched her forehead and 
cheek. 

“ Did he have another opportunity ? ” asked Tessa, 
at last. “ I can understand how afraid he was. I 
was troubled because I gave thanks for the thing 
that was taken away from me. Did he find an 
answer to his ‘ How ’ ? ” 

“ He was thankful, sincere, and careful.” 

“I should think that was enough,” exclaimed 
Tesaa, almost indignantly; “ but I know that there 
was sin somewhere, else the anger of the Lord 
would not have been kindled. They went home 
without the Ark. That is saddest of all.” 

“ It was kept three months in the house of Obed- 
edom, and during those three months humbled Da- 


AJ^OTHER OPPORTUNITY, 


87 


vid studied the law and found that his cart, new as 
it was, was not according to the will of God. 

“ ‘ Then David said, None ought to carry the Ark 
of God but the Levites; for them hath the Lord 
chosen to carry the Ark of God, and to minister 
unto Him forever.’ ” 

“And he oovld have known that before,” cried 
Tessa. 

“ ‘ And David gathered all Israel together to 
Jerusalem, to bring up the Ark of the Lord unto 
his place, which he had prepared for it, and David 
assembled the children of Aaron and the Levites, 

and said unto them. Ye are the 

chief of the fathers of the Levites: sanctify your- 
selves, both ye and your brethren, that ye may 
bring up the Ark of the Lord God of Israel unto 
the place that I have prepared for it. For because 
ye did it not at the first, the Lord our God made 
a breach upon us, for that we sought Him not 
after the due order.” 

“ Oh, how can we know every thing to do at the 
first?” 

“How could David have known? Now he had 
found the right way to do the right thing. ‘So 
the priests and the Levites sanctified themselves 
to bring up the Ark of the Lord God of Israel. And 
the children of the Levites bare the Ark of God 
upon their shoulders with the staves thereon as 
Moses commanded, according to the word of the 
Lord. And David spake to the chief of the Levites 
to appoint their brethren to be the singers with 


88 TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 

instruments of music, psalteries and harps and 
cymbals, sounding, by lifting up the voice with 
joy. So David, and the elders of Israel, and the 
captains over thousands, went to bring up the Ark 
of the covenant of the Lord out of the house of 
Obed-edom with joy.’” 

“ He was not afraid now,” said Tessa. “ I think 
that he was all the more joyful because he had 
been so humiliated and afraid. I will think about 
that new cart.” 

“ And those three months in which he was find- 
ing out the will of God. ‘And it came to pass, 
when God helped the Levites that bare the Ark of 
the covenant of fhe Lord that they offered seven 
bullocks and seven rams.’ He could not help them 
the first time because their way was not according 
to His law; their joy, their thankfulness, their sin- 
cerity, their carefulness availed them nothing be- 
cause they kept not His law. Uzza was a priest 
and should have known the law ; David was king 
and he should have known the law.” 

“ But he had his second opportunity, despite his 
mistake.” 

“ And so, if your desire be according to His will, 
may you have yours; it may be months or years, 
half your lifetime, but if you study His word and 
ask for your second opportunity through the in- 
tercession of Christ, I am sure that you will 
have it.” 

“ Sometimes I am angry, sometimes bewildered, 
sometimes there is hatred in my heart because I 


ANOTHER OPPORTUNITY. 


89 


have been deceived and humiliated— sometimes 1 
do not want it back — ” 

“My dear,” said Miss Jewett, gravely, “discipline 
is better than our heart’s desire.” 

“ Is it ? I don’t like to think so.” 

When the clock in the church-tower struck mid- 
night Tessa lay awake wondering if she could ever 
choose discipline before any heart’s desire. 

Then she crept closer to Miss Jewett and kissed 
her. 


VII. 


THE LONG DAY. 

With the apple blossoms came Tessa’s birthday. 
She had lived twenty-five years up-stairs and down- 
stairs in that white house with the lilac shrubbery 
and low iron fence. Twenty-five years with her 
father and mother, nineteen with her little sister, 
and almost as many with her old friend, Mr. Ham- 
merton; twenty years with Laura and Felix and 
Miss Jewett, and not quite three years with the 
latest friend, the latest and the one that she had 
most believed in, Kalph Towne. 

She was counting these years and these friends 
as she brushed out her long, light hair and looked 
into the reflection of the fair, bright, thoughtful 
face that had come to another birthday. 

Nothing would ever happen to her again, she 
was sure ; nothing ever did happen after one were 
as old as twenty-five. In novels, all the wonderful 
events occurred in earlier life, and then — a blank 
or bliss or misery, any thing that the reader might 
guess. 

Would her life henceforth be a blank because 
she was so old and was growing older? 


THE LONG DAY. 


91 


In one of her stories, Miss Muloch had stated 
that the experience of love had been given to 
her heroine “later than to most” and she, was 
twenty-four ! 

“Not that that experience is all one’s life,” she 
mused; “but it is just as much to me as it is to 
any man or woman that ever lived; as much as to 
Cornelia, the matron with her jewels, or Yittoria 
Colonna, or Mrs. Browning, or Hypatia, — if she ever 
loved any body, — or Miss Jewett, — if she ever did, — 
or Sue Greyson, or Queen Yictoria, or Kalph Towne’s 
mother ! I wonder if his father were like him, so 
handsome and gentle. I have a right to the pain 
and the blessedness of loving; perhaps T have been 
in love — perhaps I am now! He shut the door 
that he had opened and he has gone out; I would 
not recall him if I could do it with one breath — 

“ ‘No harm from him can come to me 
On ocean or on shore.’ 

“Well,” smiling into the sympathetic eyes, “if 
nothing new ever happen to me. I’ll find out all the 
blessedness of the old.” 

For she must always find something to be glad 
of before she could be sorrowful about any thing. 

She ran down-stairs in her airiest mood to be 
congratulated by her father in a humorous speech 
that ended with an unfinished sentence and a 
quick turning of the head, to be squeezed and 
hugged and kissed by Dinah, and dubbed Miss 
Twenty-Five, and then to have her mood changed, 


92 


TESSA WADSWORTH'S DISCIPLINE. 


all in the past made dreary, and all in the future 
desolate, by one of her mother’s harangues. 

Mr. Wadsworth had kissed his three girls and 
hurried off to his business, as he had done in all the 
years that .Tessa could remember ; Dinah had pushed 
her plate away and was leaning forward with her 
elbows on the table-cloth, her face alight with the 
mischief of teasing Tessa about being “stricken in 
years.” Tessa’s repartees were sending Dinah off 
into her little shouts of laughter when their moth- 
er’s voice broke in : 

“I had been married eight years when I was 
your age, Tessa.” 

“ It will be nine years on my next birthday,” said 
Tessa. 

“ Yes, just nine ; for I was married on my seven- 
teenth birthday ; your father met me one day com- 
ing from school and said that he would call that 
evening ; I curled my hair over and put on my gar- 
net merino and waited for him an hour. I expected 
John Gesner, too. But your father came first and 
we set the wedding-day that night. I was seven- 
teen and he was thirty-seven ! ” 

“I congratulate you,” said Tessa. “I congratu- 
late the woman who married my father.” 

“Girls are so different,” sighed Mrs. Wadsworth. 
“Now 7 had two offers that year! Aunt Theresa 
wanted me to take John Gesner because he was 
two years younger than your father; but John 
was only a clerk in the Iron Works then, and so 
was Lewis. Lewis is just my age. How could 


THE LONG DAY, 


93 


I tell that he would make a fortune buying 
nails?” 

“ You would have hit the nail on the head if you 
had known it,” laughed Dinah. 

“And here’s Dine, now, she is like me. You 
are a Wadsworth through and through! Young 
men like some life about a girl; how many beaux 
Sue Greyson has I All you think of is education 1 
There was Cliff Manning, you turned the cold 
shoulder to him because he couldn’t talk grammar. 
What’s grammar? Grammar won’t make the pot 
boil.” 

“ Enough of them would,” suggested Dinah. 

“ Mr. Towne came and came till he was tired, I 
suppose. I hope you didn’t refuse him.” 

“No, he refused me.” 

Her tone was so gravely in earnest that her 
mother was staggered. Dinah shouted. 

Mrs. Wadsworth went on in a voice that was 
gathering indignation: “You may laugh now; you 
will not always laugh. ‘He that will not when he 
may, when he will he shall have nay.’ Mrs. Sher- 
wood told me yesterday that she hoped to hare 
Nan Gerard back here for good, and Mary looked 
as if it were all settled. Mr. Towne did not do 
much ^05^, winter, Mary said, beside run around 
with Naughty Nan. I’m hearing all the time of 
somebody being married or engaged, and you are 
doing nothing but shilly-shally over some book or 
trotting around after poor folks with Miss Jewett.” 

“She will find a prince in a hovel some day,” 


94 


TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 


said Dinah. “ He will be struck with her attitude as 
she is choking some bed-ridden woman with beef- 
tea and fall down on his knees and propose on the 
spot. ‘Feed me, seraph,’ he will cry.” 

“He wouldn’t talk grammar, or he couldn’t spell 
or read Greek, and she will turn away,” laughed 
Mrs. Wadsworth. “Tessa, you are none of my 
bringing up.” 

“That is true,” replied Tessa, the sorrowfulness 
of the tone softening its curtness. 

“You always did care for something in a book 
more than for what I said! You never do any 
thing to please people; and yet, somehow, some- 
body always is running after you. I wish that 
you covld go out into the world and get a little 
character; you are no more capable of self-denial 
and heroism than an infant baby ; for getting along 
in the world and making a good match, I would 
rather have Sue Greyson’s skin — ” 

“Her father understands anatomy, perhaps you 
can get it, mother.” 

“/S'/ie knows how to look out for number one. 
Her children will be settled in life before Tessa is 
engaged. You needn’t laugh. Dine, it’s her birth- 
day, and I’m only doing a mother’s duty to her.” 

Tessa’s eyes laughed although her lips were still. 
Her sense of humor helped her to bear many things 
in her life. 

“You have never had a trial in your life, Tessa, 
and here you are old enough to be a wife and 
mother I ” 


THE LONG DAY. 


95 


“If she lived in China she could be a grand- 
mother,” said Dinah. 

“I have always kept trouble from you; that is 
why, at your mature age, you have so little char- 
acter. In an emergency you would have no more 
responsibility than Nellie Bird. If you had studied 
arithmetic instead - of always writing poetry and 
compositions, you might have been teaching now 
and have been independent.” 

“Father isn’t tired of taking care of her,” said 
Dinah, spiritedly. “It’s mean for you to say that.” 

“ Why don’t you write a novel and make some 
money?” 

“I don’t know how.” 

“ Can’t yoi4 learn ? ” 

“I study all the time.” 

“Why don’t you write flowery language?” 

“I don’t know how.” 

“It is Gus that has spoiled you; he has nipped 
your genius in the bud. What does he know, a 
clerk in a bank ? I know that he tells you to leave 
out the long words ; and it is the long words that 
take. I shouldn’t have had my dreadful cough 
winter after winter if I hadn’t worked hard to 
spare your time that winter you wrote those three 
little books for the Sunday School Union; I lay all 
my sickness and pain to that winter.” 

Mrs Wadsworth had brought this charge against 
Tessa several times before, but she had never shiv- 
ered over it as she did this birthday morning. 

“And what did you get for them? Only a hun- 


96 


TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 


dred dollars for the three. Your father made a 
great fuss over them, and he really cried (his tears 
come very easy) over that piece you called ‘Making 
Mistakes.’ I couldn’t see any thing to cry over; 
I thought you made out that making mistakes was 
a very fine thing.” 

“Four people from away off have written to 
thank her, any way,” exulted Dinah. 

“People like your father I suppose.” 

Dinah sprang up and began to rattle the cups 
and saucers ; she could not bear the look in Tessa’s 
eyes another second. 

“ Dinah, I can’t talk if you make so much noise. 
You are very rude.” 

“ Oh, I forgot to tell you,” cried Dinah, standing 
still with two cups in her hands. “ It’s great fun ! 
Nan Gerard refused Mr. John Gesner while she 
was here.” 

“ I don’t believe it,” exclaimed Mrs. Wadsworth. 
“ Those brothers are worth nearly a million.” 

“ Naughty Nan didn’t care.” 

“ She’ll jump out of the frying-pan into the fire, 
then; for the Townes, mother and son, are not 
worth a quarter of it.” 

“ What does she care ? Mr. Lewis Gesner is a 
gentleman, and he knows something.” 

“He said once that I was only a little doll,” 
said Mrs. Wadsworth. “I never liked him after- 
ward.” 

“I like him,” said Dinah; “he doesn’t flirt with 
the girls; he always talks to the old ladies.” 


THE LONG DAY, 


97 


“ What are you going to do to-day, Tessa ? ” in- 
quired Mrs. Wadsworth, ignoring Dinah’s remark. 

“Oh, I don’t know,” she answered, “and don’t 
care” was the unspoken addition. 

There was one thing she was sure to do. On 
her way to the ten o’clock mail she would take a 
moment with Miss Jewett for a word, a look; for 
something to set her heart to beating to a cheerier 
tune. Ten minutes before mail time she found 
Miss Jewett as busy as a bee. 

“ Oh, Tessa,” glancing up from her desk,” I knew 
you would come. I had a good crying spell on 
my twenty-fifth birthday and I’ve looked through 
clear eyes ever since. I wish for you that your 
second quarter may be as full of hard work as 
mine.” 

Tessa felt as if the sun were shining warm again. 
At the office she received her birthday present ; the 
one thing that she most wished for ; if ever birth- 
day face were in a glow and birthday heart set to 
dancing, hers were when her fingers held the check 
for one hundred and sixty-eight dollars and fifty 
cents, and when her eyes ran through the brief, 
friendly letter, with its two lines of praise. 

“I am taken with your book. It gives me a 
humbling-down feeling. I hardly know why.” 

“ Oh, it’s too good ! it’s too good,” she cried, with 
her head close to Miss Jewett’s at the desk over the 
large day-book. “ I was feeling as if nobody cared, 
and now he wants another book. As good as this, 
he says.” 


7 


98 


TESSA WADSWOETWS DISCIPLINE. 


Tessa lived in fairy-land for the next two hours. 
No, she lived in Dunellen on a happy birthday. 

“Well! well! well!” exclaimed her father, tak- 
ing off his spectacles to wipe his eyes, “this is 
what I call fine; So this is what you grew pale’ 
over last winter,” he added, looking down into a 
face as rosy and wide awake as a child’s waking 
out of sleep. 

“ What shall you do with so much money ? ” 

“ Spend it, of course. I have spent it already a 
hundred times.” 

“You must return receipt and reply to the letter.” 

“ I had forgotten that.” 

“ You will find every thing on my desk. Write 
your name on the back of the check and I will 
give you the money.” 

“ I don’t want to do that. I want to take it into 
the bank and surprise Gus with it. His face will 
be worth another check.” 

She wrote her name upon the check, her father 
standing beside her. Theresa L. Wadsworth. He 
was very proud of this name among his three 
girls. 

‘^'And you expect to do this thing again ? ” 

“ I do. Many times. All I want is a nook and 
a lead pencil.” 

“ Daughter, I would like something else better.” 

“I wouldn’t. Nothing else. I shall not change 
my mind even for a knight in helmet and helmet 
feather.” 

Mr. Hammerton’s face xoas worth another check ; 


THE LONG DAY. 


99 


he looked down at her from his high stool in a 
grave, paternal fashion. She remained decorously 
silent. 

“How women do like to spend money,” he 
said. “ At six o’clock you will not have a penny 
left.” 

“ How can I ? Father is to have a farm in May- 
field, mother is to go to Europe, and Dine is to have 
diamond ear-rings ! ” 

“And I?” 

‘fl will buy you a month to go fishing! And 
myself brains enough to write a better book. Isn’t 
it comical for me to get more for my book than 
Milton got for Paradise Lost ? ” 

Tessa laughed as she counted her money at tea- 
time ; there was a twenty dollar bill and seventy- 
five cents I But in her mother’s chamber stood a 
suite of black- walnut with marble tops, in one of 
Dine’s drawers, materials for a black and white 
striped silk, on the sitting-room table a copy of 
Shakespeare in three Turkey morocco volumes, for 
her father; she had also sent a gold thimble to Sue 
Greyson, several volumes of Kuskin to Mr. Ham- 
nierton, Barnes on Job to Miss Jewett, and had pur- 
chased a ream of foolscap, a pint of ink, a pair of 
gloves, and The Scarlet Letter for herself I 

“ Is there any thing left in the world that you 
want ? ” her father asked. 

“Ye^ but twenty dollars- will not buy it,” she 
replied^ thinking of Dr. Lake’s anxious face as she 
had seen it that day. 


100 TESSA WADSWORTHS DISCIPLINE. 

At night, alone in the darkness, there were a few 
tears that no one would ever know about. Her joy 
in her accepted work was nothing to Ealph Towne. 
He did not know about her book and if he knew — 
would he care ? 


VIIL 

A NOTE OUT OF TUNE. 

The blossom storm came and blew away the ap- 
ple blossoms, the heavy fragrance of the lilacs died, 
and the shrubbery became again only a mass of 
green leaves and ugly, crooked stems; but amid 
this, something happened to Tessa; something that 
was worth as much to her as any happenings that 
came before it ; something that had its beginning 
when she was a little school-girl running along the 
planks and teasing Felix Harrison. How much cer- 
tain jarring words spoken that day and how much 
a certain bit of news influenced this happening, 
she, in her rigid self-analysis, could not determine ! 

She arose from the breakfast table at the same 
instant with her father, saying: “Father, I will 
walk to the corner with you.” 

“We were two souls with one thought,” he re- 
plied. “I intended to ask you for a few minutes.” 

They crossed the street to the planks. She 
slipped her arm through his, and as he took the 
fingers on his arm with a warm grasp, she said; “I 
never want any lover' but you, my dear old father.” 


102 T£SSA WADSWORTH'S DTSC/PLIHE. 


“Nonsense, child! Only girls who have had a 
heart-break say such things to their old fathers, 
and your heart is as good as new, I am sure. 
Tessa, I want to see you married before I die.” 

“May you live till you see me married,” she 
answered merrily. “ What an old mummy you 
will be!” 

“ I have been thinking of something that I want 
to say to you. I am an old man and I am not 
young for my age — ” 

“ Now, father.” 

“I may live a hundred years, of course, and 
grow heartier each year, and like the ‘frisky old 
girl,’ die at the age of one hundred and ten, and 
‘ die by a fall from a cherry-tree then,’ but, still 
there’s a chance that I may not. And now. Daugh- 
ter Tessa ” — his voice became as grave as her eyes, 

“ I want you to promise me that you will always 
take care of your poor little mother; poor little 
mother! You are never sharp to her like saucy 
Dine, and she rests in you like an acorn in an acorn 
cup, although she would be the last to confess it.” 

“I promise to do my best,” Tessa said very 
earnestly. 

“But that is only a part of it. Promise me that 
if she wishes to marry again, and her choice be one 
that you approve — ” 

“Approve! ” 

“Approve,” he repeated, “that you will not hin- • 
der but rather further it, and keep Dine from mak- 
ing her unhappy about it.” 


A NOTE OUT OF TUNE. 


103 


“I will not promise. You shall not die,” she 
cried passionately. “ How can you talk so and 
break my heart?” 

“Dr. Watts says that we all begin to die as soon 
as we are born, so I have had to do it pretty thor- 
oughly ; but he was a theologian and not a medical 
man. Have you promised ? ” 

“Yes, sir,” speaking very quietly, “I have prom- 
ised.” 

“With her hand upon his arm, they kept even 
step for ten silent minutes. 

“Are you writing again?” 

“Yes, sir.” 

“Then you must walk every day.” 

“ Oh, I do, rain or shine. I am going down the 
road this afternoon to look at the wheat fields and 
the oat fields and to see the boys and girls drop- 
ping corn ! ” 

“And to wish that you were a little girl drop- 
ping corn ? ” 

“No, indeed,” she said earnestly and solemnly. 
“ I like my own life better than any life I ever knew 
in a book or out of a book.” 

“When I count up my mercies I’ll remember 
that.” 

She was dwelling upon those words of her father 
late that afternoon as she sauntered homeward with 
her hands full of wild flowers and grasses. 

“ Mystic, will you ride with me ? ” 

A feeling of warmth and of tenderness ever crept 
into her heart at the sound of this voice. 


104 TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 

She loved Dr. Lake. 

“No, sir, thank you; I am out for a walk and 
when I walk I never ride.” 

“But I want to talk to you — to tell you some- 
thing.” She stepped nearer and stood at the car- 
riage wheel; his voice was sharp and his white 
temples hollow. “ Sue has refused me,” he began 
with a laugh. “ I proposed last night, and what do 
you think she said ? ‘ Why, Dr. Lake, you are poor, 
and you smell of medicine.’” 

“They are both true,” she said, not conscious of 
what reply she was making. 

“Yes,” he answered bitterly, “they are both true 
and will he true until the end of time. Don’t you 
think that you could reason with her and change 
her mind; you have influence.” He laid his gloved 
hand on the hand that rested on the wheel. “ It 
will kill me. Mystic, if she doesn’t marry me.” 

So weak, so pitiful ! She could have cried. And 
all for love of flighty Sue Greyson ! 

“I was sure that she would accept me. She has 
done every thing hut accept me. I did not know 
that a woman would permit a man to take her day 
after day into his arms and kiss her unless she in- 
tended to marry him. Would you permit that ?” he 
asked. 

“You know that I would not,” she answered 
proudly; “but Sue doesn’t know any better; all 
she cares for is the ‘fun’ of the moment.” 

“I have been hoping so long; since Towne wep+ 
away; I can’t bear this.” 


A NOTE OUT OF TUNE. 


105 


“There is as much strength for you as for any 
of us,” she said gently. 

“ But I am too weak to hold it.” 

And he looked too weak to hold it. She could 
not lift her full eyes. “ I am so sorry,” was all she 
could speak. 

“There isn’t any thing worth living for anyway; 
I, for one, am not thankful for my ‘creation.’ I 
wish I was dead and buried and out of sight for- 
ever. Sue Greyson has another offer to whisper to 
all Dunellen. I would not stay here, I would go 
back to that wretched hospital, but my engage- 
ment with her father extends through another year. 
Well, you won’t ride home with me?” 

“Not to-day, I want to be out in this air.” 

“And you don’t want to be shut in here with 
my growling. I don’t blame you; I’d run away 
from myself if I could. I’ll kill half Dunellen and 
all Mayfield with overdoses before another night, 
and then take a big dose myself Say, Mystic, you 
are posted in these things, where would be the 
harm ? ” 

“ Take it and see.” 

“Not yet awhile. I am not sure of many things, 
but I am sure that a man’s life in this world will 
stare in his face in the next. And my life has not 
been fit even for your eyes.” 

Homely, shabby, old, worn, excited, with a sharp 
ring in his voice and a stoop in his shoulders. 
What was there in him to touch Sue Greyson ? 
Where was the first point of sympathy? 


106 TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE, 


Tessa could have taken him into her arms and 
cared for him as she would have cared for a child. 

“ I have just seen an old man die ; a good old 
man; he was over ninety; he prayed to the last; 
that is his lips moved and his old wife laid his 
hands together; he liked to clasp his hands when 
he prayed, she said. She put her ear down close 
to his mouth, but she could not distinguish the 
words. I was wishing that I could go in his 
place, and that he could take up my life and live 
it through for me. He would do better with it 
than I shall.” 

“ Is not that rather selfish ? ” 

“Life is such a sham. I don’t believe in the 
transmigration of souls ; I don’t want to come back 
and pull through another miserable existence.” 

“1 want you to stay this soul in this body; I do 
not want to lose you.” 

“ If every woman in the world were like you — ” 

“ And every man were as tired and hungry as 
you — ” 

“ What would he do ? ” 

“ He would hurry home to a good, hot dinner.” 

“I have not eaten or drank since yesterday morn- 
ing. Sue has a hot dinner waiting for me. She 
will sit with me while I eat, and tell me, perhaps, 
that she has had a letter from that fellow in Phila- 
delphia, or that that well-preserved specimen of 
manhood, old John Gesner, has asked her to drive 
with him. Some flirtation of hers is sauce to every 
dish.” 


A NOTE OUT OF TUNE. 


107 


“ Poor Sue,” sighed Tessa. 

“ She might be happy if she would; I would take 
care of her.” 

“ Good-by,” squeezing his fingers through his 
glove. “Go home and eat.” 

“ Give me a good word before I go.” 

“Wait.” 

“ Is that the best word you know ? ” 

“ It is good enough.” 

“Well, good day. Mystic,” he said, lifting his hat. 

She went back to the grassy wayside, thinking. 
What right had Sue Grey son’s light fingers to med- 
dle with a life like Dr. Lake’s ? They had not one 
taste in common. How could he find her attract- 
ive ? She disliked every thing in which he was in- 
terested ; it was true that she could sing, sing like 
one of the wild birds down in the woods, and he 
loved music. 

She paused and stood leaning against the rails 
of a fence, and looked across the green acres of 
winter wheat; one day in September she had stood 
there watching the men as they were drilling the 
wheat; afterward she had seen the tender, green 
blades springing up in straight rows, and once she 
had seen the whole field green beneath a light 
snow. The wind moved her veil slightly, both 
hands were drooping as her elbows leaned upon 
the upper rail, her cheeks were tinged with the 
excitement of Dr. Lake’s words, and her eyes suf- 
fused with a mist that was too sorrowful to drop 
with, tears. A quick step on the grass at her side 


108 TESSA WADSWORTH^S DISCIPLINE. 

did not startle her; she did not stir until a voice 
propounded gravely: “If a man should be born 
with two heads, on which forehead must he wear 
the phylactery ? ” 

She turned with a laugh. “ Gus, I would know 
that was you if I heard the voice and the question 
in the Great Desert.” 

“ Can’t you decide ? ” 

“ My thoughts were not nonsense.” 

“ Of course not, you were labelling and pigeon- 
holing all that you have thought of since sunrise ! 
I’ve been sitting on a stone waiting for your con- 
ference to end. Are you in the habit of meeting 
strange men and conversing with them.” 

“ Yes, I came out to meet you.” 

“I only wish you did! I wish that you would 
make a stranger of me and be polite to me. It is 
nothing new for you to be wandering on a Satur- 
day afternoon, and nothing new for you to find me.” 

“ I didn’t find you.” 

“I intended to give you the honor of the dis- 
covery; now we will share the glory. Shall we 
go on ? ” 

“I have been to my roots; do you know my 
roots? Do you know the corner above Old Place 
and the tiny stream?” 

“I know every corner, and every root, and every 
stream. Shall I carry your flowers for you? I 
never can see why I should relieve a maiden of a 
burden when her avoirdupois equals mine. You 
will not give them to me ? I have something to 


A NOTE OUT OF TUNE. 


109 


read to you — something of my own composing — I 
composed it in one brilliant wakeful moment — ^you 
will appreciate it.” 

“I do not believe it.” 

“Wait until you hear it. Lady Blue, are you 
going to be literary and never be married! Woe 
to the day when I taught you all you know.” 

They went on, slowly, for she liked to talk to 
Mr. Hammerton. “ Father said something like that 
this morning and it troubled me; why may I not 
do as I like best? Why should he care to see me 
married before he dies ? ” 

“ Why should he not ? ” 

“Nonsense. I can take good care of myself; be- 
side,” with a mischievous glance into his serious 
eyes, “I really don’t know whom to marry.” 

“ Oh, you could easily find some one. If all else 
fail, come to me, and if I am not too busy I will 
take you into consideration.” 

“Thanks, good friend! But you will always be 
too busy. What have you to read to me ? ” 

“Something that you will appreciate. I wrote 
it for you. Stay, sit down, while I read it.” 

“ I don’t want to. You can read and walk. The 
mother of Mrs. Hemans could read aloud while 
walking up hill.” 

Mr. Hammerton’s voice was not pleasant to a 
stranger, but Tessa liked it because it belonged to 
him; it was a part of him like his big nose, his 
spectacles, and the tiny bald spot over which, every 
day, he carefully brushed his hair. The color in 


110 TESSA WADSWORTH^ S DISCIPLINE. 


his cheeks was as pretty as a girl’s, and so was the 
delicate whiteness of his forehead; the bushy mus- 
tache, however, made amends for the complexion 
that he sometimes regretted; Tessa had once told 
him that his big nose, his mustache, and his awk- 
wardness were all that kept him from being as 
pretty as his sister. 

“I am not the mother of Mrs. Hemans.” He 
took a sheet of paper from his pocket-book, and 
showed her the poem written in his peculiarly plain, 
upright hand. 

“Excuse my singing and I will read. You must 
not think of any thing else.” 

“ I will not.” 

“You are walking too fast.” 

She obediently took slower steps. 

He cleared his throat and, holding the paper near 
his eyes, began to read. A shadow gathered in his 
listener’s eyes at the first four lines. 

“ A nightingale made a mistake; 

She sang a few notes out of tune, 

Her heart was ready to break, 

And she hid from the moon. 

“ She wrung her claws, poor thing. 

But was far too proud to speak; 

She tucked her head under her wing. 

And pretended to be asleep. 

“A lark arm in arm with a thrush, 

Came sauntering up to the place; 

The nightingale felt herself blush, 

Though feathers hid her face. 


A NOTE OUT OF TUNE. Ill 

“ She knew they had heard her song, 

She felt them snicker and sneer. 

She thought this life was too long, 

And wished she could skip a year. 

“ ‘ 0, nightingale ! ’ cooed a dove, 

‘O, nightingale, what’s the use; 

You bird of beauty and love. 

Why behave like a goose ? 

“ ‘ Don’t skulk away from our sight. 

Like a common, contemptible fowl; 

You bird of joy and delight, 

- Why behave like an owl ? 

“ ‘ Only think of all you have done; 

Only think of all you can do ; 

A false note is really fun 
From such a bird as you. 

“ ‘Lift up your proud little crest: 

Open your musical beak; 

Other birds have to do their best, 

You need only to speak.* 

“The nightingale shyly took 

Her head from under her wing. 

And giving the dove a look. 

Straightway began to sing. 

“ There was never a bird could pass; 

The night was divinely calm; 

And the people stood on the grass ? 

To hear that wonderful psalm ! 

“The nightingale did not care. 

She only sang to the skies; 

Her song ascended there. 

And there she fixed her eyes. 




112 TESSA WADSWORTH^ S DISCIPLINE. 

“ The people that stood below 
She knew but little about; 

And this story’s a moral, I know. 

If you’ll try to find it out.” 

“How did you know that I need that?” she 
asked, taking it from his hand. “Who wrote it ? ” 
“I did.” 

“ Don’t you know ? ” 

“No. I don’t know. I copied it for you.” 

“Thank you. I thank you very much. You 
could not have brought me any thing better.” 

“ I brought you a piece of news, too.” 

“ As good as the poem ? ” 

“Nan Gerard thinks so. She is to be married 
and to live at Old Place; our castle in the air.” 

“ Old Place isn’t my castle in the air. Who told 
you?” 

“ A woman’s question. I never told a woman a 
secret yet that she did not reply, ‘ Who told you ? ’ 
Mary Sherwood told me, of course. Do you con- 
gratulate Naughty Nan ? ” 

“Must I?” 

“It’s queer that I do not know that man. I 
have missed an introduction a thousand times. 
Do you congratulate her?” 

“I am supposed to congratulate Mm. He is 
very lovable,” 

“ I thought that only women were that.” 

“That’s an admission,” laughed Tessa, “you 
cross old bachelor.” 

“You learned that from Dine.” 


A NOTE OUT OF TUNE. 


113 


“No, I learned it from yon.” 

Tessa talked rapidly and lightly, perhaps, be- 
cause she did not feel like talking at all. 

Would he marry Nan Gerard? Why could she 
not be glad for Nan Gerard ? Why must she be 
just a little sorry for herself? Why must it make 
a difference to her ? Why must the weight of the 
flowers be too heavy for her hand, and why must 
she give them that toss over a fence across a field ? 

“ Your pretty flowers,” expostulated Mr. Ham- 
merton. 

“ I do not care for them ; they were withering.” 

“I have a thought; I wonder why it should 
come to me; I am wondering if you and I walk 
together here a year from to-day what we shall 
be talking about. My prophetic soul reveals to 
me that a year makes a difference sometimes.” 

“ I remember a year ago to-day,” she answered. 
“ A year has made a difference.” 

“ Not to you or me ? ” 

“To Nan Gerard?” she answered seriously. 

“But that does not affect us.” 

Did it not? A year ago to-day Ealph Towne 
had brought her some English violets, and she had 
pressed them and thrown a thought about him 
and about them into a poem. To-day had he taken 
violets to Nan Gerard ? 

“Lady Blue; you are absent-minded.” 

“ Am I ? I was only labelling and pigeon-hol- 
ing a thought; it is to be laid away to moulder 
with the dust of ages.” 


114 T£SSA WADSWORTH^ S DISCIPLINE. 


“ A thought that can not be spoken ? ” 

“ A thought that it was folly to think, and that 
would be worse than folly to speak.” 

If he replied she did not hear; they sauntered 
on, she keeping the path and he walking on the 
grass. 

A carriage passed, driving slowly. The two la- 
dies within watched the pedestrians, — a fair-faced 
girl with thoughtful eyes, and a tall man with an 
intellectual face, — as if they were a part of the land- 
scape of the spring. 

“ ‘ In the spring young man’s fancy — ’ ” 

laughingly quoted one of them. 

“Will she accept or refuse him?” asked the other. 

“If she do either it will be once and forever,” 
was the reply seriously given. “Did you notice her 
mouth ? She has been very much troubled, but she 
can be made very glad.” 

After the carriage had passed, Mr. Hammerton 
spoke, “ I am glad we amused those people ; they 
failed to decide whether or not we are lovers.” 

“They have very little penetration, then,” said 
Tessa. “ I am too languid and you are too uncon- 
scious.” 

“There is nothing further to be said; you do not 
know what you have nipped in the bud.” 

“ I suppose we never know that.” 

Dinah met them at the gate, her wind-blown 
curls and laughing eyes in striking contrast to the 
older face that had lost all its color. Tessa did not 


A NOTE OUT OF TUNE. 


115 


see that Mr. Hammerton’s eyes were studying the 
change in her face ; she had no more care of the 
changes in her face with him than with Dinah. 

“ ni be in about eight,” he said to Dinah, as Tessa 
brushed past him to enter the gate. 

Another thing that influenced impressible Tessa 
this day, was a talk at the tea-table. They were 
sitting around the tea-table cozily, the four people 
who, in her mother’s thought, constituted all Tessa’s 
world. Mr. Wadsworth in an easy position in his 
arm-chair was listening to his three girls and de- 
ciding that his little wife was really the handsom- 
est and sprightliest woman that he had ever seen, 
that happy little Dine was as bewitching as she 
could well be, and that Tessa, the light of his eyes, 
was like no one else in all the world. Not that any 
stranger sitting in his arm-chair would have looked 
through his eyes, but he was an old man, disap- 
pointed in his life, and his three girls were all of 
earth and a part of heaven to him. They were all 
talking and he was satisfled to listen. “ I believe 
that some girls are born without a mother’s heart,” 
Mrs. Wadsworth said in reply to a story of Dine’s 
about a young mother in Dunellen who had slapped 
her baby, saying that she hated it and was nothing 
but a slave to it! “Now, here’s Tessa. Bhe, has no 
motherliness. Only this morning Freddie Stone fell 
down near the gate and hurt his head; his screams 
were terrifying, but she went on working and let 
him scream, I said it is all as girls are born.” 

“Yes,” answered Tessa, in the deliberate way in 


116 TESSA WADSWORTH'S DISCIPLINE. 


which she had schooled herself to reply to her 
mother, “I know that your last assertion is true. 
There was a lady in school, a teacher of mathemat- 
ics, she acknowledged that she did not love her 
own little girls as other mothers seemed to do. 
She stated it as she would have stated any fact in 
geometry; perhaps she thought that she was no 
more responsible for one than for the other. The 
mere fact of motherhood does not bring mother 
love within ; any mother that does not give to her 
child a true idea of the mother-heart of God fails 
utterly in being a mother. She may be a nurse, a 
paid nurse, or a nurse upon compulsion ; any hired 
nurse can wash a child’s face, can tie its sash and 
make pretty things for it to wear, and any nurse, 
who was never mother to a child, can teach it what 
God means when He says, ‘ as a mother comfort- 
eth.’ Miss Jewett could not be happier in her Bi- 
ble-class girls if they were all her own children ; she 
says so herself Mary Sherwood said to her one 
day, ‘ If my mother were like you, how different I 
should have been ! ’ ” 

“Such a case is an exception,” returned Mrs. 
Wadsworth excitedly. 

“ Nineteen out of her twenty-three girls tell her 
their troubles when they would not tell their own 
mothers,” said Dinah. “ She has twenty-three se- 
cret drawers to keep their secrets in.” 

“She has time to listen to fol-de-rol. She ad- 
vises them all to marry for some silly notion and 
let a good home slip, I’ve no doubt.” 


A NOTE OUT OF TUNE. 


117 


“ I expect that twenty-one of her girls have re- 
fused John Gesner,” laughed Mr, Wadsworth. “He 
will have to bribe Miss Jewett to let them alone.” 

“ Only twenty, father,” said Dine. “ Tessa and 
Sue and I are waiting to do it.” 

“I will make this house too uncomfortable for 
the one of you that does refuse him.” 

“ Mother ! mother ! ” remonstrated Mr. Wads- 
worth gently. 

“ He’ll never have the honor,” said Dine. “ Mr. 
Lewis Gesner is the gentleman ; I have always ad- 
mired him. Haven’t you, Tessa ? ” 

“Yes; I like to shake hands with him; he has a 
trustworthy face.” 

“So much for the mothers of Dunellen, Tessa; 
how about the fathers? Would the girls like to 
have Miss Jewett for a father, too ? ” 

“ Oh, the fathers have the bread- winning to do. 
If the mothers do not understand, we can not ex- 
pect the fathers to understand. There was a girl 
at school who had had a hard home experience; 
she told me that she never repeated the second 
word of the Lord’s prayer; that she said instead: 
Our Lord, who art in heaven ? ” 

“ Oh, deary me ! How dreadful ! ” cried Dinah, 
moving nearer the arm-chair and dropping her 
head on her father’s shoulder. “Didn’t she ever 
learn to say it?” 

“Not while we were at school.” 

“Tessa, you can talk,” said her mother. 

“ Yes,” said Tessa, humbly, “ I can talk.” 


118 TESSA WADSWORTH'S DISCIPLINE. 


“She was a very wicked girl,” continued Mrs. 
Wadsworth. “I don’t see how she dared; I should 
think that she would have been afraid of dying in 
her sleep as a judgment sent upon her.” 

“Perhaps she did not repeat the prayer as a 
charm,” answered Tessa, in her clearest tones. 

Dinah lifted her head to laugh. 

“ You upheld her, no doubt,” declared Mrs. Wads- 
worth. 

“^I sympathized with her as they who never had 
u pain can feel for the sick,” said Tessa, smiling 
into her father’s eyes. 

“ How did you talk to her ? ” asked Dine. 

“ What is talk ? I only told her to wait and she 
would know.” 

“ It’s easy to talk,” said Mrs. Wadsworth uncom- 
fortably. “You can talk an hour about sympathy, 
but you didn’t run out to Freddie Stone.” 

“Why didn’t you?” inquired her father seriously. 

Tessa laughed, while Dine answered. 

“ Mother was there talking as fast as she could 
talk, Bridget was there with a basin of water and 
a sponge, Mrs. Bird had run over, a carriage with 
two ladies, a coachman and a footman had stopped 
to look on, and oh, I was there too. He was some- 
what bloody.” 

“You are excused, daughter. Save your ener- 
gies for a time of greater need.” 

“ Energies ! Need ! ” tartly exclaimed Mrs. Wads- 
worth. “ If she begins to be literary, she will care 
for nothing else.” 


A NOTE OUT OF TUNE, 


119 


“ I see no evidence of a lessening interest yet,” 
replied her father. 

“ Oh, I might know that you would encourage 
her. She might as well have the small-pox as 
far as her prospects go! A needle is a woman’s 
weapon.” 

“ You forget her tongue, mother,” suggested 
Dine. “Oh, Tessa, what is that about a needle; 
Mrs. Browning says it.” 

Tessa repeated : 

“ ‘ A woman takes a housewife from her breast, 

And plucks the delicatest needle out 

As ’twere a rose, and pricks you carefully 

’Neath nails, ’neath eyelids, in your nostrils, — say, 

A beast would roar so tortured — but a man, 

A human creature, must not, shall not flinch. 

No, not for shame.’” 

“ Some woman wrote that when she’d have done 
better to be sewing for her husband, I’ll war- 
rant,” commented Mrs. Wadsworth. Mr. Wads- 
worth looked grave. 

“ Oh she had a literary husband,” replied Tessa, 
mischievously. “ A word that rhymed with supper 
would do instead of bread and butter ; and he cared 
more for one of her poems than he did for his 
buttons.” 

“Literary men don’t grow on every bush; and 
they don’t take to literary women, either,” said her 
mother. 

“Mother, you forget the Howitts, William and 
Mary; what good, good times they have taking 


120 TESSA WADSWORTH^ S DISCIPLINE. 

long walks and writing; like you and Gus, Tessa, 
and Mr. and Mrs. Browning — ” 

“You don’t find such people in Dunellen; we live 
in Dunellen. Gus will choose a woman that doesn’t 
care for books, and so will Mr. Towne, mark my 
words! And so will Felix Harrison, even if he is 
killing himself with study.” 

“ He is improving greatly,” said Mr. Wadsworth, 
pulling one of Dine’s long curls straight. “ He is 
going away Monday to finish his studies.” 

“ I honor him,” said Tessa, fiushing sliglitly. 

“ Don’t,” said Dine, “ he sha’n’t have you, Tessa. 
Don’t honor him.” 

“That’s all you and your father think of — ^keep- 
ing Tessa. She needs the wear and tear of mar- 
ried life to give her character.” 

“ It’s queer about that,” rejoined Tessa in a per- 
plexed tone, playing with her napkin ring. “If 
such discipline he the best, why is any woman 
permitted to be without it? Why does not the 
fitting husband appear as soon as the girl begins 
to wish for him ? In the East, where it is shame- 
ful for a girl not to be married at eleven, I have 
yet to learn that the wives are noted for strength 
or beauty of character.” 

“You may talk,” said her mother, heatedly, “but 
two years hence you will dance in a brass kettle.” 

“ I hope that I shall work in it,” answered Tes- 
sa, coloring painfully, however. Whether her lips 
were touched with a slight contempt, or tremulous 
because she was very, very much hurt, Dinah could 


A NOTE OUT OF TUNE. 


121 


not decide; she was silent because she could not 
think of any thing sharp enough to reply ; she never 
liked to be too saucy. 

Mr. Wadsworth spoke in his genial voice: “It’s 
a beautiful thing, daughters, to help a good man 
live a good life.” 

Dinah thought: “I would love to do such a beau- 
tiful thing.” Tessa was saying to herself, “Oh, 
what should I do if my father were to die 1 ” 

Mr. Wadsworth pushed back his chair, went 
around to his wife and kissed her. Tessa loved 
him for it. 

“You have helped a good man, a good old man, 
haven’t you, fairy?” he said, smoothing the hair 
that was as pretty as Dinah’s. 

“Yes,” answered his wife, and Tessa shivered 
from head to foot. “ People all said that you were 
a different man after you were married.” 

“I’m going over to Norah’s,” cried Dinah. “I 
told her that I would come to write our French 
together. And, oh, father! I forgot to tell you, 
Gus will be in about eight.” 

“I don’t know that I care for chess; I can not 
concentrate my attention as I could a year ago.” 

“Why do you run off if he is coming?” asked 
Mrs. Wadsworth. 

“He comes too often to be attended to,” Dine 
answered. “Won’t you be around, Tessa?” 

“Perhaps.” 

Tessa had resolved to give the evening to writ- 
ing letters, and was passing through the dining- 


122 TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 


room with a china candlestick in her hand, when 
her father, reading Shakespeare at the round table, 
on which stood a shaded lamp, detained her by 
catching at her dress. 

“ Set your light down, daughter, and stay a 
moment.” 

With her hand upon his shoulder, she looked 
down over the page he was reading: 

“ ‘Heaven doth with us as we with torches do; 

Not hght them for themselves — ’ ” 

she read aloud. 

“ I made my will to-day,” he said quietly; “ that 
is, I changed it. Lewis Gesner and Gus Hammer- 
ton, my tried friends, were in the office at the time. 
If you ever need a friend, daughter, any thing done 
for you that Gus can not do — I count on him as the 
friend of my girls for life — go to Lewis Gesner.” 

“I don’t want a friend; I have you.” 

“ If I should tell your mother about the will she 
would go into hysterics, and Dine would be sure 
that I am going to die; I have divided my little 
all equally among my three. That is, all but this 
house and garden, which I have given to my elder 
daughter, Theresa Louise. It is to be hers solely, 
without any gainsaying. Your mother will fume 
when the fact is made known to her, but I give it 
to you that my three girls may always have a 
roof, humble though it be, over their heads. The 
old man did not know how to make money, but he 
left them enough to be comfortable all their lives ; 


A NOTE OUT OF TUNE. 


123 


there was never any need that his wife should worry 
and work, or that his daughter should marry for a 
home. Very good record for the old man; eh, 
daughter ? ” 

She laid her cheek against the bald forehead and 
put both arms around his neck. 

“And, Tessa, child, your mother is half right 
about you ; don’t have any notions about marriage ; 
promise me that you will marry — for you will, some 
day — but for the one best reason.” 

“What is that?” she. asked roguishly. “How 
am I to know ? ” 

“ What do you think ? ” 

“ Because somebody needs me and I can do him 
good.” 

“A Hottentot might urge that; you will find the 
reason in time. Don’t make an idol ; that is your 
temperament.” 

“ I know it.” 

“And above all things don’t sacrifice yourself; 
few men appreciate being done good to ! I know 
men, they are terribly human. Gus Hammerton is 
a fine fellow.” 

“ATe is terribly human,” she answered with a lit- 
tle laugh. 

“ Am I harsh towards your mother ever, do you 
think ? ” he asked in a changed tone. 

“ Why, 710 ,” she exclaimed in surprise. 

“ I used to be. I tried to mould her. Don’t you 
ever try to mould any body ; now run away to your 
work or to your book ! Don’t sigh over me, I am 


124 TESSA WADSWORTH^S DISCIPLINE, 

‘ well and hearty.’ How short my life seems when 
I look back. Such dreams as I had. It-’s all right, 
though.” 

She could not run away, for the door-bell, in an- 
swer to a most decided pull, detained her; she 
opened it, expecting to see Mr. Hammerton, but 
to her surprise, and but slightly to her pleasure, 
Felix Harrison stood there in broad-shouldered 
health. 

“Good evening,” she said with some bewilder- 
ment. 

“Do I startle you?” he asked in the old gracious, 
winning manner. “ May I come in ? ” 

“ I am very glad to see you. Will you walk into 
my parlor, Mr. Fly ? ” 

The one tall candle in the china candlestick was 
the only light in the room. She set it upon the ta- 
ble, saying, “ Excuse me, and I will bring a light, 
that we may the better look at each other. The 
light of other days is hardly sufficient.” 

“ It is enough for me,” he said, pushing the otto- 
man towards one of the low arm-chairs. “ Sit down 
and I will take the ottoman. The parrot recog- 
nizes me.” 

Her hand moved nervously on the arm of her 
chair; the hand was larger now than when it 
had spilled ink on his copy-book, larger even than 
when it had written her first, shy, proud, indig- 
nant refusal. 

“You are not the tempest you used to be,” he 
said smiling after a survey of her face. 




A NOTE OUT OF TUNE. 


125 


“ Wasn't I a tempest ? I have outgrown my lit- 
tle breezes. In time I may become as gentle as a 
zephyr.” 

“ You always were gentle enough.” 

“ Not to you.” 

“ Not to me when I tormented you.” 

“ Probably I should not be gentle if I were tor- 
mented now.” 

She had never decided to which of the five thou- 
sand shades of green Felix Harrison’s eyes be- 
longed; they were certainly green; one of the 
English poets had green eyes, she wondered if 
they were like Felix Harrison’s. To-night they 
glittered as if they were no color at all. This face 
beside her was a spiritualized face ; a strong mouth 
as sweet as a woman’s, a round benevolent chin ; a 
low, square forehead ; hair as light as her own ; his 
side face as he turned at least five years younger 
than the full face; she had often laughed at his 
queer fashion of growing old and growing young. 
At times, in the years when they were more togeth- 
er than of late, he had changed so greatly that, 
after not having seen him for several days she had 
passed him in the street without recognition ; these 
times had been in those indignant times after she 
had refused him ; that they were more than indig- 
nant times to him she was made painfully aware 
by these changes in his rugged face. 

“ I have been thinking over those foolish times,” 
she said, breaking the silence. “I am glad that 
you came in to-night ; I am in a mood for confess- 

f 


126 TESSA WADSWORTH^S DISCIPLINE. 


ing my wrong-doings; I have said many quick 
words; you know you always had the talent for 
irritating me.” 

“Yes, I always worried you.” 

“You did not intend to,” she said hastily, watch- 
ing the movement of his lips ; “ we did not under- 
stand, that is all. It takes longer than a summer 
and a winter for heart to answer to heart.” 

“We have known each other many summers 
and many winters.” 

“And now we are old, sensible, hard-working 
people ; having given up all nonsense we are dis- 
covering the sense there is in sense.” 

He turned his face with a listening look in his 
eyes. 

“ Did not some one come in ? Shall we be dis- 
turbed ? ” 

“Not unless we wish to be. It is only Mr. Ham- 
merton, he is a great friend of father’s. He renews 
his youth in him.” 

“ Is he not your friend ? ” 

How well she remembered his suspicious, exact- 
ing questions ! 

“ He is my best friend,” she said proudly. 

“I wish I was in heaven,” he said, his voice 
grown weak. “ Every thing goes wrong with me ; 
every thing has gone wrong all my life. Father 
is in a rage because I will not stay home ; he of- 
fered me to-day the deed for two hundred acres as 
a bribe. I should be stronger to-day but that he 
worked my life out when I was a growing boy.” 


A NOTE OUT OF TUNE. 


127 


“A country life is best for you. Your old home- 
stead is the loveliest place around, with its deep 
eaves and dormer-windows and vines. That wide 
hall is one of my pleasant recollections, and the 
porch that looks into the garden, the blue hills 
away off, and the cool woods, the thrushes and the 
robins and the whip-poor-will at twilight ; that sol- 
itary note sets me to crying, or it used to when I 
dreamed dreams and told them to Laura ! I hope 
that Laura will love the place too well to leave it; 
it is my ideal of a home ; much more than splendid 
Old Place is.” 

“ I will stay if you will come and live in it with 
me,” he said quietly. 

“ I like my own home better,” she answered as 
quietly. “Are you stronger than you were ? ” 

“ Much stronger. I have not had one of those 
attacks since March. Lake warns me; but I am 
twice the man that he is ! How he coughed last 
winter ! I haven’t any thing to live for, anyway.” 

“ It is very weak for you to say that.” 

“ Whose fault is it that I am so weak ? Whose 
fault is it that my life is spoiled? You have spoiled 
every thing for mehy playing fast and loose with 
me.” 

“I never did that,” she answered indignantly. 
“You accuse me wrongfully.” 

“ Every time you speak to me or look at me you 
give me hope; an hour with you I live on for 
months. 0, Tessa,” dropping his head in both 
hands, “I have loved you all my life.” 


128 TESSA WADSWORTH^S DISCIPLINE. 


“ I know it,” she said solemnly. “ Can't you be 
brave and bear it ? ” 

“I am bearing it. I am bearing it and it is 
killing me. You never had the water ebb and 
flow, ebb and flow when you were dying of thirst. 
Women can not suffer; they are heartless, all their 
heart is used in causing men to suffer. A touch 
of your hand, the color in your cheek, a dropping 
of your eyes, talks to me and tells me a lie; and 
then you go up-stairs and kneel down to Him, who 
is the truth-maker! You are a covenant-breaker. 
You have looked at me scores of times as if you 
loved me; you have told me that you like to be 
with me; and when I come to you and ask you like 
a man to become my wife, you blush and falter, and 
answer like a woman — no. I beg your .pardon — ” 

The tears stood in her eyes but would not fall. 

“ I did not come here to upbraid you. I did not 
start from home with the intention of coming ; but 
I saw you through the window with your arms 
around your father’s neck and I thought, ‘Her 
heart is soft to-night; she will listen to me.’ I 
was drawn in, as you always draw me, against my 
better judgment. I shall not trouble you again ; I 
am going away. Tessa,” suddenly snatching both 
hands, “ if you are so sorry for me, why can’t you 
love me ? ” 

“I don’t know,” not withdrawing her hands, 
“ something hinders. I honor you. I admire you. 
Your love for me is a great rest to me ; I want to 
wrap myself up in it and go to sleep; I do not 


A NOTE OUT OF TUNE. 


129 


want to give it up — no one else loves me, and I do 
want somebody to love me.” 

“ I will love you ; only let me. Marry me and I 
will stay at home ; I will do for you all that a hu- 
man heart and two human hands can do ; I will he 
to you all that you will help me to be.” 

“ But I do not want to marry you,” she said per- 
plexed. “ I should have to give up too much. I 
love my home and the people in it better than 1 
love you.” 

“ I will not take you away; you shall have them 
all; you shall come to them and they shall come 
to you; remember that I have never loved any 
one but you — ” the great tears were rolling down 
his cheeks. “I am not worth it; I am not wor- 
thy to speak to you, or even to hold your hands 
like this.” He broke down utterly, sobbing wea- 
rily and excitedly. 

“ Don’t, oh, don’t,” she cried hurriedly. “ I may 
grow to love you if you want me to so much, 
and you are good and true, 1 can believe every 
word you say — not soon — in two or three years 
perhaps.” 

His tears were on her hands, and he had loved 
her all her life ; no one else loved her, no one else 
ever would love her like this; he was good and 
true, and she wanted some one to love her; she 
wanted to be sure of love somewhere and then to 
go to sleep. Her father should see her married be- 
fore he died; her mother would never — 

“You have promised,” he cried, in a thick voice. 

9 


130 TESSA WADSWORTH'S DISCIPLINE. 


“You have promised and you never break your 
word.” 

“ I have promised and I never break my word ; 
but you must not speak of it to any one, not even 
to Laura, and I will not tell father, or Gus, or Miss 
Jewett, or Dine; no one must guess it for one year 
— it is so sudden and strange ! I couldn’t bear to 
hear it spoken of; and if you are very gentle and 
do not try to make me love you — ^you must not 
kiss me, or put your arms around me, you know 
I never did like that, and perhaps that is one 
reason why I never liked you before — ^you must 
let me alone, let love come of itself and grow of 
itself.” 

“ I will,” he uttered brokenly, and rose up trem- 
bling from head to foot. “ May God bless you ! — 
bless you ! — bless you ! ” 

It was better for him to leave her ; the strain had 
been too great for both. 

“ I must be alone ; I must go out under the stars 
and thank God.” 

' She lifted her face to his and kissed him. How 
unutterably glad and thankful she was in all her 
life afterward that she gave that kiss unasked. 

“ God bless you, my darling,” he said tenderly, 
“ and He will bless you for this.” 

Bewildered, not altogether unhappy, she sat alone 
while he went out under the stars. 

Was this the end of all her girlhood’s dreams? 

Only Felix Harrison! Must she pass all her life 
with him ? Must her father and mother and Gus 


A NOTE OUT OF TUNE, 


131 


and Dine be not so much to her because Felix Har- 
rison had become more — had become most ? And 
Ralph Towne? Ought she to love Felix as she 
had loved him ? 

The hurried questions were answerless. She did 
not belong to herself; not any more to her father 
as she had belonged to him half an hour since with 
both her arms around his neck. Love constituted 
ownership, and she belonged to Felix through this 
mighty right of love ; did he belong to her through 
the same divine right ? 

He was thanking God and so must she thank 
Him. 

“Tessa,” called her father, “come here, daugh- 
ter ! ” 

With the candle in her hand, she stood in the 
door- way of the sitting-room. “Well,” she said. 

“With whom were you closeted?” asked Mr. 
Hammerton, looking up from the chess-board. 

The effort to speak in her usual tone lent to her 
voice a sharpness that startled herself. 

“ Felix Harrison.” 

“Your old tormentor!” suggested Mr. Hammer- 
ton. 

“ Who ever called him that ? ” She came to the 
table, set the candlestick down and looked over 
the chess-board. 

“ She has refused him again,” mentally decided 
Mr. Hammerton, carefully moving his queen. 

“ 1 called you, daughter, because Gus withstood 
me out and out about ‘ Heaven doth with us as we 


132 TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 


with torches do.’ Find it and let his obstinate 
eyes behold ! ” 

She opened the volume, turning the leaves with 
fingers that trembled. “Truly enough,” she was 
thinking, “a year from to-day will find a difier- 
ence.” 

“ Now I am going over for Dine,” she said, after 
Mr. Hammerton had acknowledged himself in the 
wrong. 

“ Permit me to accompany you,” he said. Even 
with Tessa Wadsworth, Gus Hammerton was often 
formal. They found Dinah bidding Norah good-by 
at Mr. Bird’s gate ; they were laughing at nothing, 
as usual. 

“Let us walk to the end of the planks,” sug- 
gested Mr. Hammerton. “On a night like this I 
could tramp till sunrise.” He drew Tessa’s arm 
through his, saying, “Now, Dine, take the other 
fin.” 

The end of the planks touched a piece of woods ; 
at the entrance of the wood stood an old building, 
windowless, doorless, chimneyless; the school chil- 
dren knew that it was haunted. 

“We’re afraid,” laughed Dine; “the old hut looks 
ghostly.” 

“ It ^ ghostly. I will relate its history. Once 
upon a time, upon a dark night, so dark that 
I could not see the white horse upon which I 
rode — ” 

“ Oh, that’s splendid,” cried Dinah, hanging con- 
tentedly upon his arm. “ Listen, Tessa.” 


A NOTE OUT OF TUNE. 


133 


But Tessa could not listen. She was feeling 
the peace that rested over the woods, the fields; 
that was enwrapping Old Place, and further down 
the dim road the low-eaved homestead that must 
thenceforth be home to her. There could be no 
more air-castles ; her future was decided. She had 
turned the leaf and discovered a name that hith- 
erto had meant so little : Felix Harrison. Not Kalph 
Towne ; a year ago to-night it was English violets 
and Ralph Towne. The peace that brooded over 
all might be hers, if only she would be content. 

At this moment, — while she was trying to be con- 
tent, trying to believe that she could interpret the 
peace of the shining stars, and while she was hear- 
ing the sound of her companion’s words, a sol- 
emn, even tone that rolled on in unison with her 
thoughts, — two people far away were thinking of 
her; thinking of her, but not wishing and not 
daring to speak her name. 

“ I can not understand, Ralph. I was sure that 
we would bring Naughty Nan away with us.” 

“ Truly, mother, I would have pleased you, if I 
could.” 

“You are too serious for her; with all her mis- 
chievous advances,* — like a white kitten provok- 
ingly putting out its paw, — she was more than 
half afraid of you.” 

“ It does not hurt her to be afraid.” 

“ She is most bewitching.” 

“Now, mother! But it is too late; she will un- 
derstand by my parting words that 1 do not ex- 


134 T£SSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 

pect to see her soon again. In my mind is a 
memory that has kept me from loving that deli- 
cious Naughty Nan.” 

“ Is the memory a fancy ? ” 

“No; it is too real for my ease of mind. If I 
were a poet, which I am not, I should think that 
her spirit haunted me.” 

“ Can you tell me no more of her? That daugh- 
ter that I might have had ! ” 

“I do not understand her: she is beyond me, she 
baffles me.” 

“ I read of a man once who loved a woman too 
well to marry any one else, and yet he did not love 
her well enough to marry her.” 

“ Was he a fool ? ” 

“Answer the question for yourself. Are you a 
fool?” 

“ Yes, I am. I do not know my own mind. I 
should call another man a fooL” 

“ It may not be too late,” she gently urged. 

“ Too late for what ? ” he asked irritably. 

“ To be wise.” 

In a few moments he spoke in an abrupt, changed 
tone — 

“ Mother ! I have decided at last. I shall hang 
out my shingle in Dunellen. It is a picturesque 
little city, and the climate is as good for you as the 
south of France.” 

“I am very glad,” she answered cordially. “You 
are a born physician, you are cool, you are quick, 
you are gentle ; you can keep your feelings under 


A NOTE OUT OF TUNE. 


135 


perfect control. You are not quite a Stoic, but you 
will do very well for one.” 

“ But you will not be happy at Old Place with- 
out me.” 

“ Why should I be without you ? ” 

“You have noticed that large, wide brick house 
on the opposite side of the Park from Miss Jewett’s? 
It has a garden and stable; it is just the house for 
us; you may have two rooms thrown into one for 
your sitting-room and any other changes that you 
please.” 

“I remember it, I like the situation; there are 
English sparrows in the trees.” 

“We will take that for the present. John Gesner 
owns it ; he will make his own price if he sees that 
I want it, I suppose. I do want it. There are not 
many things that I desire more. You and I will 
have a green old age at Old Place.” 

“You forget that I am thirty years older than 
you, my son.” 

By accident, one day, Mrs. Towne had come 
across, in one of the drawers of her son’s writing- 
table, a large photograph of Tessa Wadsworth, a 
vignette, and she had gazed Jong upon her ; the 
face was not beautiful, one would not even think 
of it as pretty, but it was fine, intellectual, sensi- 
tive, and sweet. In searching for an old letter not 
long before leaving home, she had discovered this 
picture, defaced and torn into several pieces. 

“ Kalph, you will not be angry with your white- 
headed old mother, but were you ever refused ? ” 


136 TESSA WADSWORTH^S DISCIPLINE. 


“ No,” he said, laughing. “ A dozen women may 
have been ready to refuse me, but not one ever did.” 

“Nor accepted you, either,” she continued, 
shrewdly. 

He arose and began to pace the floor; after some 
turns of excited movement, he came to her and 
stood behind her chair. “ I know that I have been 
accepted; I know that I asked when I did not 
intend to ask — that is — I was carried beyond my- 
self; I asked when I did not know that I was 
asking.” 

“ What shall you do now ? ” 

“I shall ask in reality; I shall confess myself in 
the wrong.” 

“ And she ? ” 

“ And she ? She has the tenderest heart in the 
world. She has forgiven me long ago.” 

“Do not trust her eyes and forget her lips,” 
warned his mother. “ Love is slain sometimes.” 

He resumed his walk with a less confident air. 
He Imd forgotten her lips. 

Would Tessa have cared to hear this? Would 
she have forgotten Felix, his blessing and the quiet 
of the holy stars ? 

“Oh,” cried Dinah, with her little shout (she 
would not have been Dinah without that little 
shout), “ Oh, Tessa, did you hear ? ” 

“ She is star-gazing,” said Mr. Hammer ton. 

“It isn’t a true story,” pleaded Dinah. “You 
didn’t really see him hanging by the rope and the 
woman looking on.” 


A NOTE OUT OF TUNE. 


137 


“ My young friend, it is an allegory ; that is what 
you will drive some man to some day.” 

“ You know I won’t. What is the name of that 
bright star ? ” 

“ It isn’t a star, it’s a planet.” 

“ How do I know the difference ? ” 

“ Lady Blue knows.” 

“Do you call her that because her eyes are so 
blue or because she is a blue-stocking ? ” 

“She is not a blue-stocking; I will not allow it. 
It is for her eyes.” 

“ Gus,” said Dinah, “ I can’t understand things.” 

“ What things ? ” 

“Tennyson’s Dream of Fair Women.” 

“I shouldn’t think you could. I have spent 
hours on it trying to make it out. You look up 
Marc Antony and Cleopatra — ” 

“ As if I had to.” 

“Well, look up the daughter of the warrior Gil- 
eadite, and fair Kosamond, and angered Eleanor, 
and Fulvia, and Joan of Arc.” 

“ And will you read it to us, and talk all about 
it ? ” cried Dinah in delight. “ I like King Lear 
when father reads it, but I can’t understand Shake- 
speare; he is all conversations.” 

Mr. Hammerton laughed, and patted her head. 
“I will bring you the stories that Charles and 
Mary Lamb gathered from Shakespeare.” 

“ Shall we turn ? ” asked Tessa, slipping her hand 
through his arm ; he instantly imprisoned her fin- 
gers. Felix would be troubled and angry she knew. 


138 TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE, 


even at this clasp of an old friend’s hand. J ealousy 
was his one strong passion ; he was jealous . of the 
books she read, of the letters she received, of every 
word spoken to her that he did not hear; she won- 
dered as her fingers drew themselves free, if he 
would ever become jealous of her prayers. 

She drew a long breath as the weight of her 
bondage fell heavier and heavier ; and then, he was 
so demonstrative, so lavish of his caresses, and her 
ideal of a lover was one who held himself aloof, 
who kept his hands and his lips to himself. She 
sighed more than once as she kept even pace with 
the others. 

“Has the nightingale made a mistake?” asked 
Mr. Hammerton, as they were crossing to the gate. 

“She only made one mistake. I wonder how 
many I can make if I do my best to make them.” 

Dinah opened the gate ; her father’s light streamed 
through the windows over the garden, down the 
path. 

“Good night,” said Mr. Hammerton. “ Oh, I just 
remember, what shall I do? I asked my cousin 
Mary to go to a lecture on Burns with me to- 
night, and I declare! I never thought of it until 
this minute.” 

“ Mary Sherwood will give it to you,” said Di- 
nah. “ I wonder what your wife will do with you.” 

“ A wife’s first duty is obedience,” he answered. 

“I’d like to see the man I’d promise to obey,” said 
Dinah, quickly. 

“I expect you would,” he said gravely. 


A NOTE 0U7 OF TUNE. 


139 


Dine darted after him to box his ears, words be- 
ing impotent, and Tessa went into the house. “I 
think I’ll pigeon-hole this day and then go to bed,” 
she said, a merry gleam crossing her eyes ; “between 
my two walks on the planks to-day, I have lived 
half a lifetime. I hope Dr. Lake is asleep ; I will 
never hurt Felix as he is hurt.” 


IX. 

THE NEW MORNING. 

Her eyes were wide open an hour before the 
dawn ; as the faint light streamed through the east 
and glowed brighter and brighter along the rim of 
the south that she could see from her position on 
the pillow, she arose, wrapped a shawl about her, 
and went to the window to watch the new morn- 
ing. On the last night of the old year she had 
watched the sunset standing at her western win- 
dow, then the light had gone out of her life and all 
the world was dark ; now, in the new year, her pri- 
vate and personal new year, the light was rising, 
creeping up slowly into the sky, the gold, the faint 
rose and the bright rose running into each other, 
softening, blending, glowing deeper and deeper as 
she watched. This new morning that was an old 
morning to so many other eyes that were looking 
out upon it ; this new morning that would be again 
for Dinah, perhaps, and for all the other girls 
that were growiiig up into God’s kingdom on the 
earth ! The robins in Mr. Bird’s apple orchard 
were awake, too, and chanticleer down the road 


THE NEW MORNING. 


141 


had proclaimed the opening of another new day 
with all his lusty might. She wondered, as she 
listened and looked, if Felix were standing in the 
light of the morning on the porch, or he might be 
walking up and down the long garden path. And 
thanking God? She wished that she were thank- 
ing God. She was thanking Him for the light, the 
colors, the refreshing, misty air, the robins and 
the white and pink wealth of apple blossoms; but 
she was not thanking Him because Felix Harrison 
loved her. 

“And that night they caught nothing.” 

The words repeated themselves with startling 
clearness. What connection could they possibly 
have with the sunrise? Oh, now she knew; it 
was because the fishermen had seen the Lord upon 
the shore in the morning. 

B}ie had caught nothing; all her night of toil 
had been fruitless ; she had striven and hoped and 
dreamed, oh, how she had dreamed of all that she 
would do and become ! And now she could not be 
glad of any thing. 

The years had ended in having Felix Harrison 
love her ; that was all. She had lived her childhood 
and girlhood through for such a time as this. 

This new year had brought more hard things to 
bear than any of the old years; if she could only 
tell some one who would care and sympathize with 
her and help her not only to bear but to do and to 
become; but her father would be justly angry and 
exclaim, “Madness, daughter,” her mother would 


142 T£SSA WADSWORTH^S DISCIPLINE. 


laugh and look perplexed, Miss Jewett would say, 
“0, Tessa, Tessa, I didn’t think such a thing of 
you,” and Mr. Towne — but she had no right to 
think of him ! And Gus ! He would look at her 
steadily and say nothing; he would be disappoint- 
ed in her if he knew that she could promise with 
her lips, with no love in her heart save the love of 
regret, compassion, and contrition for all that she 
had so unconsciously caused him to suffer. And 
how could she reveal to Felix, poor Felix! the 
plain, cold truth! how she shrank from him as 
soon as she was alone and could think! how as 
the morning grew brighter and her world more 
real she shrank from him yet more and more ! how 
the very thought of his presence, of his tight arms 
around her, and his smooth face close to hers gave 
her a feeling of repulsion that she had never felt 
towards any human being before ! She felt that she 
must flee to the ends of the earth rather than to 
endure him. But it was done ; she must keep her 
word; he should never guess; she would write a 
note and slip it into his hand to-day, he would be 
sure to press through the crowd towards her as she 
came out of church. She would write it now and 
be at rest. Her writing-desk stood open, pages of 
manuscript were laid upon it. She selected a sheet 
of lemon-colored note paper, and wrote a message, 
hurriedly, in pencil. Never afterward would she 
write a word upon lemon-colored paper. 

“Do not come to me, dear Felix — ” she hesitated 
over the adjective, erased the words, and dropped 


THE NEW MORNING. 


143 


the sheet into her waste paper basket and found 
another: “Do not come to me, Felix, until I send 
for you, please. I am not strong. I want to be 
alone. Do not think me unkind, you know that I 
always did like to be alone. Do not expect too 
much of me; I am not what you think; I am a 
weak, impulsive woman, too tender-hearted to be 
wise, or to be just towards myself or towards you. 
If you want me to love you, ask it of Him, who 
is love; do not ask it of me, I am not love. But 
do not be troubled, I have given my word, I am 
not a covenant-breaker, I will he true.'' 

She folded it, not addressing it, and placed it in 
the pocket of the dress that she would wear to 
church; as she passed the window she saw Dr. 
Lake driving towards home. Shivering, although 
the sun was high enough to. shine on the apple 
blossoms, she crept back to bed, nestling close to 
sleepy Dine who loved her morning nap better 
than the sunrise. Her confused thoughts ran hith- 
er and thither; she found herself repeating some- 
thing that she and Mr. Hammerton had learned to- 
gether years ago, 

“‘Yes,’ I answered you last night; 

‘No,’ this morning, sir, I say; 

Colors seen by candlelight 
Do not look the same by day.” 

Mr. Hammerton said that he and the Wadsworth 
girls had learned “ miles ” of poetry together. The 
Harrisons were not at church. When had such 


144 TESSA WADSWORTH^ S DISCIPLINE. 


a thing happened before? Her fingers were on 
the note in her pocket as she passed down the 
aisle. 

“Tessa, Tessa,” whispered a loud whisper behind 
her, and Sue’s irrepressible lips were close to her 
ear; “come home to dinner with me; you won’t 
want to go to Bible class, for Miss Jewett is down 
to Harrison’s. Father sent for her to go early this 
morning.” 

“ Why is she there ? ” 

“Oh, somebody is sick. Felix. Dr. Lake was 
there in the night and father was going this morn- 
ing. He was taken crazy, I believe. Come home 
with me, will you ? ” 

“Very well.” 

She found Dine waiting for Norah, and told her 
that she was going home with Sue, then rejoined 
Sue at one of the gates. 

“I’m awful lonesome Sundays,” began Sue; “Aunt 
Jane has gone, I told you, didn’t I ? A cousin of 
hers died and left some dozens of young ones and 
she had to go and take care of them and console 
the widower. ‘ The unconsolable widder of Deacon 
Bedott will never get married again ! ’ but she went 
all the same. She said that she had brought me up 
far enough to take care of father.” • 

Sue’s lightness grated all along her nerves. 

“Did you like Mary Sherwood’s hat? Too many 
fiowers, don’t you think so? And she wear 
light blue with her sallow face ! Wasn’t it a queer 
sermon, too? Don’t you think it is wicked for min- 


THE NEW MORNING. 


145 


isters to frighten people so ? He said that we make 
our own lives, that we choose every day, and that 
every choice has an influence. You think that I 
don’t listen because I stare around, don’t you? I 
sha’n’t forget that ever, because I have just had 
a choice that will influence my life; and I chose 
mt to do it. It’s hateful to have Miss Jewett 
away; I won’t go to Bible class, and I won’t let 
you, either. I have a book to read, or I can go 
to sleep.” 

“Yes, you can go to sleep.” 

“ I have something to tell you,” said Sue, shyly, 
hesitating as she glanced into Tessa’s quiet, al- 
most stern, face. 

“ Not now — in the street.” 

“Oh, no, when we are by ourselves. Our par- 
lors are lovely now ; you will see how I have flxed 
up things. Father is so delighted to have me home 
that he will let me do any thing I like.” 

Voices behind them and voices before them, now 
and then a soft, Sunday laugh; through the pauses 
of Sue’s talk Tessa listened, catching at any thing 
to keep herself from thinking. 

“ A rare sermon.” 

“ It will do me good all the week.” 

“ The most becoming spring hat I’ve seen.” 

“He is very handsome in the pulpit.” 

“ Come over to tea.” 

“I expect to do great things this summer.” 

“If I could talk like that I’d set people to 
thinking.” 

10 


146 TESSA WADSWORTH'S DISCIPLINE. 


“We sha’n’t get out of trouble in this world.” 

“ When I can’t forgive myself, I just let go of 
myself, and let God forgive me.” 

She wished that she could see that face; the 
voice sounded familiar, the reply was in a man’s 
voice; she felt as if she were listening, but she 
would have liked to hear the reply, all the more 
when she discovered that the talkers were Mr. 
Lewis Gesner and his sister. 

'‘^Isfit she handsomely dressed?” exclaimed Sue 
in admiration. “ She passed me without seeing me. 
He is so wrapped up in that sister that he will 
never be married.” 

The crowd became thinner; couples and threes 
and fours, sometimes only one, entered at each 
gate as they moved on; they passed down the 
long street almost alone; Dr. Greyson’s new house 
stood nearly a mile from the Park; there was a 
grass plot in front and stables in the rear. 

Dr. Lake was driving around to the stables. 

“I hoped that he wouldn’t be home to lunch; 
he’s awful cross,” said Sue, with a pout and a flush. 
Fifteen minutes later the lunch bell rang ; Dr. Grey- 
son hurried in as they were seating themselves at 
the table. 

Tessa’s quickened heart-beats would not allow 
her to ask about Felix; she knew that her voice 
would betray her agitation ; Dr. Lake had shaken 
hands and had not stopped to speak to her; his 
miserable face was but a repetition of yesterday. 

Dr. Greyson seldom talked of any thing but his 


THE NEW MORNING. 


147 


patients and he was interested in Felix Harrison, 
she knew that she had but to wait patiently. 

“ Susie is a perfect housekeeper, isn’t she? Some- 
body will find it out, I’m afraid.” 

“That’s all I am,” said Sue. “Father, why didn’t 
you educate me ? ” 

“ Educate a kitten ! ” 

“ How is Felix Harrison ? ” inquired Dr. Lake. 

“ Bad ! Bad enough. That fellow has been walk- 
ing around with a brain fever. He’ll pull through 
with care. Miss Jewett will stay until they can 
get a nurse; I would rather keep her., though. I 
warned him months ago. I told him that it would 
come to this. He has thrown away his life; he’ll 
never be good for any thing again. I am glad 
that he has a father to take care of him ; lucky for 
him, and not so lucky for his father. I wouldn’t 
care to see my son such a wreck as he’ll be. Why 
a man born with brains will deliberately make a 
fool of himself, I can’t understand. Teaching and 
studying law and what not? He will have fits as 
long as he lives coming upon him any day any 
hour ; he will be as much care as an infant. More ; 
for an infant does grow up, and he will only be- 
come weaker and weaker mentally and physically. 
He has been under some great excitement, I sus- 
pect. They don’t know what it is. He came home 
late last night; his father heard a noise in his room 
and went in to find him as crazy as a loon. He 
said that he had heard him talking in his sleep all 
night long for two or three nights. I hope that 


148 TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 


he isn’t engaged. I know a case like his, and that 
poor fellow was engaged.” 

“Of course that ended it,” said Sue. “A sick 
husband of all things. I would drown myself, if I 
had a sick husband.” 

“Of course it ended it. It almost broke her 
heart, though; broke it for a year, and then a 
dashing cousin of his mended it.” 

“Perhaps Felix hasn’t any cousin. Dr. Lake, 
will you have more coffee ? ” Sue spoke carelessly, 
not meeting his glance. 

“Thank you, no.” 

Dr. Greyson ran on talking and eating; “I told 
the old man the whole truth ; he begged so hard to 
know the worst. He cried like a baby. He was 
proud of Felix. Felix was a fine fellow, — a noble 
fellow. But he’s dead now; dead, and buried.” 

“Does Laura know? ” inquired Sue, helping her- 
self to sweet pickled peaches. Tessa was tasting 
the peaches, her throat so full of sobs that she 
swallowed the fruit with pain. 

“No, of course not. I told Miss Jewett to tell 
her any thing, but be sure to keep her up. He 
won’t die. Why should he? It will come grad- 
ually to her. The very saddest case I know. And 
to think that it might have been avoided. I didn’t 
tell his father that., though. Felix has no one but 
himself to thank. I warned him a year ago. Brains 
without common sense is a very poor commodity. 
What did the minister tell you Miss Tessa? I 
haven’t been to church since Sue was a baby.” 


THE NEW MORNING. 


149 


“ No wonder that I’m a heathen, then ; any body 
would be with such a father,” retorted Sue. 

Dr. Lake excused himself abruptly, and crossing 
the hall went into the office. 

“That foolish boy has taught me a lesson. I 
would take a vacation this summer, only if I leave 
Sue at home she would run off and marry Lake be- 
fore a week.” 

“You needn’t be afraid,” answered Sue, scorn- 
fully. “I look higher than Gerald Lake.” 

The office door stood ajar. Sue colored with 
vexation as the words in her high voice left her 
lips. 

“ Shall we go into the parlor ? ” she said rising. 
“You can find a book and I’ll go to sleep.” 

The parlors had been refurnished in crimson and 
brown. Standing in the centre of the front parlor, 
Tessa exclaimed, “ Oh, how pretty ! ” 

“Isn’t it? All my taste. Dr. Lake did advise 
me, though; he went with me. Now, you shall sit 
in the front or back just as you please, in the most 
comfortable of chairs, and I will sit opposite you 
and snooze, — that is,” rather doubtfully, for she 
was afraid of Tessa, “unless you will let me tell 
you my secret.” 

In passing through the rooms, Tessa had taken 
a volume of Josephus from a table; she settled her- 
self at one of the back windows in a pretty crimson 
and brown chair, smoothed the folds of her black 
dress, folded her hands in her lap over the green 
volume, and looked up at Sue. Sue and a book in 


150 TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE, 

brown paper were in another crimson and brown 
chair at another window; flushed and vexed she 
played with the edges of her book. 

“ Do you think that he heard what I said ? ” she 
asked anxiously. 

“You know as well as I.” 

She did not feel in a gentle mood towards Sue ; 
her voice and words had rasped her nerves for the 
last hour. 

“ 1 didn’t intend it for him,” she was half crying, 
“ but father provoked me. He does bother me so. 
I didn’t flirt with him, I was real good and sisterly. 
I told him to call me Sister Sue. But after it all, 
he asked me to marry him, and was as mad as a 
hornet, and said dreadful things to me when I re- 
fused him.” 

She nibbled the edge of her book; Tessa had 
nothing to say. 

“ I couldn’t help it now, could I ? ” in a tearful 
voice. 

“ You know best.” 

“I know I couldn’t. I like him. I can’t help 
liking him; a cat or a dog would like him. In 
some things, I like him better than Stacey, and I’m 
sure I like him better than old John Gesner.” 

Tessa opened her book and looked into the hand- 
some face of Flavius J osephus. 

“ Haven’t you any thing to say to me ? ” 

“No.” 

“You might sympathize with me.” 

“I don’t know how.” 


THE NEW MORNING. 


151 


Sue nibbled the edge of her book, with her eyes 
filled with tears. She had no friend except Tessa, 
and now she had deserted her ! 

Tessa turned the leaves and thought that she 
was reading; she did read the words: “The family 
from which I am derived is not an ignoble one, 
but hath descended all along from the priests ; and 
as nobility among several people is of a different 
origin, so with us to be of the sacerdotal dignity is 
an indication of the splendor of a family.” 

“Yes,” she tried to think, her eyes wandering 
out of the window towards the rear of Gesner’s 
Row, “and that is why the promise, to be made 
kings and priests — ” 

“ Tessa, I think you are real mean,” said Sue, in 
a pathetic voice. 

Tessa met her eyes and smiled. She did not like 
to be hard towards Sue. 

“ Do you think that I’ve been so wicked ? ” 

“ I think that you have been so wicked that you 
must either be forgiven or punished.” 

“Oh, dear! Oh, dear me,” dropping her head on 
the arm of her chair. 

Tessa turned another leaf “Moreover when I 
was a child and about fourteen years of age, I was - 
commended by all for the love I had to learning ; 
on which account the high priests and principal 
men of the city came then frequently to me to- 
gether, in order to know my opinion about the 
accurate understanding of points of the law.” 

Her eyes wandered away from the book and out 


152 TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE, 


the open window towards the rows of open win- 
dows in the houses behind the stables. At one 
window was seated an old man reading; in the 
same room, for he raised his head to speak to her, 
at another window, a woman was sitting reading 
also. She was glad that there were two. She won-* 
dered if they had been kind to each other as longl 
as they had known each other. If the old man 
should die to-night would the old woman have 
need to say, “Forgive me.” Through the windows 
above came the heavy, steady whirr of a sewing- 
machine, with now and then a click,, as if the long 
seam had come to its end ; the bushy, black head of 
a German Jew was bent over it; the face that he 
raised was not at all like that of the refined Flavius 
fJosephus. No one ever went to him with knotty 
points in the law ! There were plants in the other 
window of the room; she was glad of the plants. 
It was rather mournful to be seeking things to be 
glad about. A child was crying, sharply, rebel- 
liously ; a woman’s sharper voice was breaking in 
upon it. 

There was a voice in the stable speaking to a 
horse, “Quiet, old boy.” A horse was brought out 
and harnessed to a buggy without a top. Dr. 
Greyson climbed into the buggy and drove off. 
Another horse was brought out and harnessed to 
a buggy with a top. She persuaded herself that 
she was very much interested in watching people 
and things ; she had not had time to think of Felix 
yet. Dr. Lake came out, sprang into the buggy, 


THE NEW MORNING. 


153 


and drove slowly out, not looking towards the 
windows where sat the two figures, each appar- 
ently absorbed in a book. 

“Tessa,” in a broken voice, like the appeal of 
a naughty child with the naughtiness all gone, 
“ what shall I do ? ” 

“ I don’t know,” said Tessa. 

“You don’t think that I ought to marry him. 
He smells of medicine so.” 

“I do not think any thing. If I did think 
any thing, it would be my thinking and not 
yours.” 

“ Do you believe that he cares so very much ? ” 

The exultant undertone was too much for Tessa’s 
patience. 

“ I hope that he has too much good sense to care 
long ; some day when he can see how heartless you 
are, he will despise himself for having fancied that 
he loved you.” 

“You don’t care how you hurt my feelings.” 

“ I am not sure that you have any to be hurt.” 

“ You are a mean thing; I don’t like you; I wish 
that I hadn’t asked you to come.” 

Tessa’s eyes were on Josephus again. 

After a long, silent hour, during which Sue looked 
out the window, and nibbled the edge of her book, 
and during which Tessa thought of every body and 
every thing except Felix Harrison, Sue spoke: “I’m 
going up-stairs for a while; excuse me, please.” 

Tessa nodded, closed her book and leaned back 
in the pretty crimson and brown chair. Sue came 


154 TESSA WADSWORTHS DISCIPLINE. 


to her and stood a moment; her heart loas sore. 
If Tessa would only say something kind! But 
Tessa would not; she only said coolly, “Well?” 

“You don’t believe that I am sorry.” 

“ I don’t believe any thing about it, but that you 
are heartless and wicked.” 

Sue stood waiting for another word, but Tessa 
looked tired, and as if she had forgotten her pres- 
ence. Why should she look so. Sue asked her- 
self resentfully; she had nothing to trouble her? 
Sue went away, her arms dropped at her side, her 
long green dress trailing on the carpet; tender- 
ness gathered in Tessa’s eyes as the green figure 
disappeared. “ I don’t like to be hard to her,” she 
murmured. 

The terrible thought of Felix pressed heavier and 
heavier. She took the note from her pocket and 
pondered each word ; the cruel, truthful words I If 
he had read them she might have had to believe 
all her life that she had hastened this illness 1 The 
sunshine grew warmer, beating down upon the 
paving stones in the yard, the faces kept their 
places in the windows, the child’s shrill, rebel- 
lious cry burst out again and the woman’s sharper 
voice. 

Sue’s steps were moving overhead; suddenly, so 
suddenly as to break in upon the current of her 
thoughts, Sue’s voice rang out in her clear soprano, 
“ Kock of Ages, cleft for me.” 

The voice grated, the words coming from the 
thoughtless lips grated on her ear and on her heart, 


THE NEW MORNING. 


155 


grated more harshly than the woman’s sharp voice 
in taunting rebuke. 

“ Nothing in my hand I bring, 

Simply to Thy cross I cling.” 

As soon as she had decided that she could not 
bear it another instant, the singing ceased. It 
ceased and left her in tears. 


X. 


FORGETTING THE BREAD. 


Again Tessa was spending the night with Miss 
Jewett; Sue xGreyson had chatted away half the 
evening, and it was nearly eleven before Tessa 
could put both arms around her friend and squeeze 
her. 

“lam hungry for a talk with you, you dear little 
woman, every thing is getting to be criss-cross with 
me nowadays ; I’m so troubled and so wicked that 
I almost want to die. You wouldn’t love me any 
more if you could know how false I am. All my 
life I have been so proud of being true,” she added 
bitterly, “ I despise myself” 

“ Is that all ? ” 

Miss Jewett was leaning back in her little rock- 
er. Almost before she knew it herself, Tessa had 
dropped upon the carpet at her feet. 

“ I have come to learn of you my saint.” 

“What have you come to learn, my sinner?” 

“ I’m confused — I’m bewildered — I’m all in a tan- 
gle. People say, ‘ pray about it ’ ; you say that your- 
self; and I do pray about all the trials in my life and 


FORGETTING THE BREAD. 


157 


yet — I can not understand — I am groping my way, 

I am blind, walking in the dark. Do you know that 
I believe that praying for a thing is the hardest 
way in the world to get it ? I would rather earn 
it a thousand times over; I know that you think 
me dreadfully wicked, but do not stop me, let me 
pour it all out ; hard praying, never ceasing, night 
and day, is enough to wear one out soul and body, 
because you must expect to get what you ask for, 
and if you do not after praying so long the disap- 
pointment is heart-breaking. There now ! I have 
said it and I feel better. I have no one except you 
to talk to and I wouldn’t dare tell you how wicked 
I am. About something I have prayed with all my 
strength — I will not be ashamed to tell you — I 
know you will understand; it is about loving some- 
body. I have been so ashamed and shocked at 
girls’ love-stories and I wanted one so true and * 
pure and unselfish and beautiful, and I have prayed 
that mine might be that, and I have tried so hard 
to make it that, and yet I get into trouble and 
break my own heart, which is nothing at all, and 
more than break some one else’s heart and do as 
much harm as Sue Greyson does, who is as flighty 
as a witch! I would rather go without things 
than pray years and years and be disappointed 
every day, or go farther and farther into wrong-do- 
ing as I do ; I don’t believe that the flightiest and 
flirtiest of your girls does as much harm as I do, or 
is as false to herself as I am I And I have been so 
proud of being true I ” 


158 TESSA WADSWORTH’S DISCIPLINE, 


“ My djear child.” 

“ Is that all you can say to comfort me ? ” 

“ Why do you pray ? ” 

“Why do I pray?” repeated Tessa in surprise. 
“ To get what I want, I suppose.” 

“ I thought so.” 

“ Isn’t that what you pray for ? ” 

“Hardly. I pray that I may get what God 
wants.” 

“ Oh,” said Tessa with a half startled, little cry. 

“I fear that you are having a hard time over 
something, child.” 

“ If you only knew — but you wouldn’t believe in 
me any longer; neither would father, or Dine, or 
Gus, or any one who trusts me; I will not tell you; 
I have lost all faith in myself.” 

“Thank God for that!” exclaimed the little 
woman brightly. 

“I am too sore and bruised to be thankful; I feel, 
sometimes, as if I could creep into a dark corner 
and cry my heart out. I could bear it if I were 
the only one, but to think that I must make some- 
body’s heart ache as mine does I I thought all my 
prayers would prevail to keep me from making 
mistakes.” 

“Perhaps you have been trying to mrn your 
heart’s desire by heaping up prayers, piling them 
up higher and higher, morning, noon, and night, 
and you have held them up to God thinking that 
He must be glad to take them ; I shouldn’t wonder 
if you had even supposed that you were paying 


FORGETTING THE BREAD, 


159 


Him overmuch — you had prayed enough to get 
what you want some time ago.” 

“That is true,” answered Tessa, emphatically. 
“I have felt as if He were wronging me by tak- 
ing my prayers and giving me so little in re- 
turn. I believe that I have thought my prayers 
precious enough to pay for any thing. I paid my 
prayers, and I am disappointed that I have not my 
purchases.” 

“Then your faith has been all in your prayers'' 

“Yes; I was sure that I could not go wrong be- 
cause I prayed so much.” 

“ And your faith has been in your faith." 

“And neither my faith nor my prayers have kept 
me from being false. Oh, it has been such hard 
work ! ” 

Tessa’s face was drawn as if by physical pain. 

“ I was thinking in the night last night that I did 
not believe that Hannah, or Elizabeth, or Huldah, or 
Persis, or Dorcas ever prayed more fervently or un- 
ceasingly than I have ; I have builded on my faiths 
no wonder that the first rough wind has shaken 
my foundation! Ever since Felix Harrison years 
ago called me a flirt, I have prayed that I might 
be true; and to-night I am as false as Sue Greyson.” 

“Through an experience once, long ago, I learned 
to pray that the will of God might be done in me, 
even although I must be sifted as wheat.” 

“I am not brave enough for that. Oh, Miss 
Jewett, I am afraid that God is angry with me; 
and I have meant to be so true.” 


160 TESSA WADSWORTH^S DISCIPLINE. 


“ Do you remember the time that the disciples 
forgot to take bread ? ” 

“Yes, but that is not like me.” 

“ I think it is — -just like you.” 

“Then tell me.” 

“ It was one time when Jesus and the disciples 
were alone on board the ship; He had been deeply 
grieved with the Pharisees, sighing in His spirit 
over them, for they had tempted Him with asking 
of Him a sign from heaven. A sign from heaven ! 
And He had just filled four thousand hungry peo- 
ple with seven loaves and a few small fishes ! 

“By and by He began to talk to the disciples; 
speaking with authority, perhaps, it even sounded 
severe to them as He charged them to beware of 
the leaven of the Pharisees. 

“Then they began to talk among themselves: 
what had they done to be thus bidden to beware 
of the leaven of the Pharisees ? Leaven reminded 
them of bread ! Oh, now they knew ! They had 
but one loaf in the ship; they had forgotten to 
bring bread with them; perhaps the Lord was 
hungry and knew that they had not enough for 
Him and for themselves. It may be that He over- 
heard them reasoning among themselves, or per- 
haps, forward Peter asked Him if He were rebuk- 
ing them for forgetting the bread ; for as soon as 
He knew what was troubling their simple hearts, 
how He talked to them ! Seven questions, one 
after another. He asked them, ending with: How 
is it that ye do not understand ? 


FORGETTING THE BREAD. 


161 


“And you are like them, child. The Lord has 
suffered you to be led into trouble that He may 
teach you something about Himself and you fall 
down at His feet bemoaning yourself; you forget 
Him and the great lessons He has to teach you 
and think only of yourself and some little thing 
that you missed doing; you missed it, blinded with 
tears in your eagerness to do right, you meant to 
be so good and true, and because you made a mis- 
take in your blindness and eagerness, you think 
Him such a harsh, unloving Father that all He 
cares to do is to punish you ! Trust Him, Tessa ! 
Don’t moan over a loaf of bread forgotten before 
Him who has love enough, and power enough to 
give you and somebody beside a thousand thou- 
sand loaves. Do not grieve Him by crying out 
any longer, ‘ Do not punish me ; I meant to be so 
good?”’ 

Tessa’s head kept its position. When she raised 
it, after a long silence, she said : “ I will not think so 
any more ; you don’t know what I suffered in think- 
ing that He is punishing me.” 

“ ‘ How is it that ye do not understand ? ’ ” 

“Because I think about my own troubles and 
not of what He is teaching me,” said Tessa humbly. 


XL 

ON THE HIGHWAY. 

In June, Tessa gathered roses for Miss Jewett, 
and every evening filled the tall glass vase with 
white roses for the tea-table; in June, Dunellen 
Institute closed for the season and Dinah was grad- 
uated; henceforth she would be a young lady of 
leisure, or a young lady seeking a vocation. In 
June, Mrs. Wadsworth scolded Tessa for “taking 
it so coolly about the dreadful thing that had come 
upon young Harrison.” 

“ How many times have you called to see Laura 
since her poor brother has been so poorly ? ” 

“ I have called every two days,” answered Tessa 
in her quietest tones. 

“Oh, you have! Why didn’t you say so? You 
are so still that people think you do nothing but 
pick roses. Anxious as I am, you might have told 
me how he was getting on. How was he yester- 
day? ” 

“Comfortable.” » 

“ Did you see him ? ” 

“Yes.” 


ON THE HIGHWAY. 


163 


“Was lie sitting up?” . 

“Yes, he had been sitting up half an hour.” 

“ How does he look ? ” 

“His eyes are deep in his head, his voice is 
as weak as a child’s, he burst into tears because 
Laura did not come when he touched his bell for 
her.” 

“ Was he cheerful ? ” 

“ He smiled and talked.” 

“ Are you going to-day ? ” 

“Yes; Dr. Lake will call for me about five.” 

“You and Dr. Lake are getting to be great 
friends.” 

“ Are we ? ” 

“Do you know what he says about Felix? ” 

“ He can say nothing but that he may never be 
himself again.” 

“Yes, he did; but you mustn’t repeat it; promise 
me.” 

“ There is no need for me to promise.” 

“He said that his mind will grow weaker and 
weaker. Do you know that he has been having fits 
for two years ? ” 

“Yes, I am aware of it.” 

“ Isn’t it a dreadful, horrible thing? But he al- 
ways was a little wild and queer, not quite like 
other folks. I was sure that he would die ; he may 
yet, he may have a relapse. I should think that 
they would rather have him dead than grow silly. 
I suppose that Laura will never be married now ; 
he will never be fit to be left alone. His father can 


1G4 TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 


marry though, and that would leave her free. I 
never object to second marriages, do you ? ” 

“ That depends upon several things.” 

“ My father was married three times. I had two 
stepmothers, and might have had four if he had 
lived longer. Some people think, but I never did, 
that an engagement is as good as a marriage, do 
you ? ” 

“Yes.” 

“ Of course, I knew that you would think so ! 
But I never had any high-flown ideas about en- 
gagements. I was engaged to John Gesner — ^your 
father doesn’t know it to this day — he has high and 
mighty ideas about things like you. You ought to 
have some feeling about Felix Harrison, then, for 
he always wanted you. Professional men are al- 
ways poor; Dr. Lake is not much of a ‘catch.’” 

“ I think he is — or will be — to the woman who 
can appreciate him.” 

“ I beseech you don’t you go to appreciate him.” 

“ I do now — sufficiently,” she answered, smiling. 

Two weeks later, having seen Felix several times 
during the interval. Dine brought her a letter late 
in the afternoon. 

Felix always had written her name in full, say- 
ing that it was prettier than the one that she had 
given herself in baby -days; the penmanship ap- 
peared like a child’s imitation of his bold strokes. 

Not daring and not caring to open it immedi- 
ately, she put on her hat and went out to walk far 
past the end of the planks down into the green 


ON THE HIGHWAY. 


165 


country. She thought that she knew every tree 
and every field all the long way to the Harrison 
Homestead. 

Opening the letter at last, she read : 

“My Friend, — I suppose you know all the truth. 
I wrung it out of Dr. Greyson to-day after you left 
,me. You may have known it all the time. Father 
has known it, but not Laura. I shall never be 
what I once was; I know it better than any phy- 
sician can tell me. If I live to forget every thing 
else (and I may), I think that I shall never forget 
that night. But I shall not let my mind go with- 
out a struggle; I shall read, I shall write, I shall 
travel, when I am able. I have been reading Ma- 
caulay to-day. I shall be a burden to father and 
Laura, and to any who may nurse me for wages. 
But I shall not be a burden to you. I know that 
you meant that you would never break our cove- 
nant, when you said: ‘Promises are made to be 
kept,’ but I will break it. I am breaking it now. 
You did belong to me when you last said good-by 
and laid your young, strong hand over my poor 
fingers; but you do not belong to me as you read 
this. As I can not know the exact moment when 
you read it, I can never know when you cease to 
belong to me. Laura and father intend to take me 
away; do not come to me until I return. No one 
knows. In all my ravings, I never spoke your 
name ; it was on my mind that I had promised not 
to speak of it, and I never once forgot. But your 


166 TESSA WADSWORTH^S DISCIPLINE. 

presence was in every wild and horrible dream; 
you were being scalped and drowned and burned 
alive, and often and often you sat beside me hold- 
ing my hand; many many times you came to me 
and said, ‘I will keep my word,’ but something 
took you away ; you never went of your own ac- 
cord. I have asked them all what I raved about 
and every name that I spoke, but no one has an- 
swered ‘Tessa.’ Write to me this once, and never 
again, and tell me that you agree, that you are 
willing to break the bond that held us together 
such a little while. I am a man, and a selfish one 
at that, therefore I rejoice that you were mine. 
You can have but one answer to give. I will not 
accept any devotion from you that may hinder your 
becoming the happy wife of a good man. Do not 
be too sorry for me. Laura will expect you to 
write to her, but I pray you, do not write ; I should 
look for your letters and they would take away 
the little fortitude I have. Be a good girl; love 
somebody by and by. You have burned a great 
many letters that I have written. This is the last. 

“F.W. H.” 

Again and again she read it, pausing over each 
simple, full utterance. He could never say to her 
again, “You have spoiled my life.” She had done 
her best to atone for the sorrow that she had so un- 
wittingly caused him, and it had not been accepted 
by Him who had planned all her life. There was 
nothing more for her to do. The letter was like 


ON THE HIGHWAY. 


167 


him. She remembered his kindly, gracious ways ; 
his eagerness to be kind to her, how he would sit 
or stand near her to watch her as she talked or 
worked; how timidly he would touch her dress or 
her hand ; how his face would change if she chanced 
to look up at him ; how his pale green eyes would 
glitter when she preferred the society of Gus Ham- 
merton or any other of the Dunellen boys, ever so 
long ago, as they were boys and girls together; al- 
most as long ago as when she was a little girl and 
he a big boy and he would bring her fruit and 
flowers ! On their Saturday excursions after nuts 
or berries or wild flowers, how he would fall be- 
hind the others when she did and catch her hand 
if they heard a noise in the woods or lost them- 
selves for half a minute among a new clump of 
trees. 

In the long, happy weeks that she had passed at 
the Homestead, in the days when his mother was 
alive, how thoughtful he had been of her comfort, 
how he had tried to please her in work or play! 
One evening after they had all been sitting to- 
gether on the porch and telling stories, she had 
heard his mother say to his father: “Tessa has 
great influence over Felix, I hope that she will 
marry him.” 

“1 won’t,” her rebellious little heart had replied. 
And at bedtime she had told Laura that she meant 
to marry a beautiful young man with dark eyes 
who must know every thing and wear a cloak. 
“And Felix has light eyes,” she had added. 


168 TESSA WADSWORTH'S DISCIPLINE. 


She laughed and then sighed over the foolish, in- 
nocent days when girlhood and womanhood had 
meant only wonderful good times like the good 
times in fairy tales and Bible stories. 

Then for the last time she read his letter and tore 
it into morsels, scattering them hither and thither 
as she walked. 

She had done all she could do ; he could not keep 
hold of her hand any longer. 

The last bit of paper fluttered on the air ; she gave 
a long look towards the dear old Homestead; she 
could see the spires of the two churches at May- 
field, the brass rooster on the school-house where 
Felix had taught, and then she turned homeward 
to write the letter that would release him from the 
covenant whose keeping had been made impossi- 
ble to them. As she turned, the noise of wheels 
was before her, the dust of travel in her face ; she 
lifted her eyes in time to return a bow from Ralph 
Towne and to feel the smile that lighted the face 
of the white-haired lady at his side. 

In the dusk she came down-stairs, dressed for a 
walk, with several letters in her hand. 

“ Whither does fancy lead you, daughter ? ” her 
father asked as she was passing through the sit- 
ting-room. He was lying upon the lounge with a 
heavy shawl thrown over him ; his voice came quick 
and sharp as though he were in pain. 

She moved towards him instantly. “Why, fa- 
ther, are you sick?” 

“No, dear, not — now,” catching his breath. “I 


ON THE HIGHWAY. 


169 


have been in pain and it has worn upon me. Grey- 
son gave me something to carry with me some time 
ago, I have taken it three times to-day and now I 
shall go to sleep? ” 

“ Are you sure you feel better ? ” she asked ca- 
ressing the hand that he held out to her. “ Let me 
stay and do something for you.” 

“No. I must go to sleep. Run along. I have 
sent your mother away, and now I send you away.” 

She lingered a moment, stooping to kiss the bald 
forehead and then the plump hand. 

Her father was very happy to-night, for her 
mother, of her own accord, for the first time in fif- 
teen years, had kissed him. 

He held Tessa’s hand thinking that he would tell 
her, then he decided that the thought of those fif- 
teen years would hurt her too sorely. 

“ I thought that you meant to tell me something,” 
she said. 

“No; run along.” 

Along the planks, along the pavement, across 
the Park, she walked slowly, in the summer star- 
light, with the letters in her hand. 

‘ ‘ Star light ! Star bright ! 

I wish I may, I wish I might, 

See somebody I want to see to-night.” 

A child’s voice was chanting the words in a 
dreamy recitative. 

“Dear child,” sighed Tessa, with her five and 
twenty years tugging at her heart. 


170 TESSA WADSWORTH^S DISCIPLINE. 

She longed for a sight of Miss Jewett’s untrou- 
bled face to-night ; if she might only tell her about 
the right thing that she had tried to do and how 
the power to do it had been taken from her ! 

But no one could comfort her concerning it; not 
her father, not Miss Jewett, not Kalph Towne, not 
Gus Hammerton, not Felix! 

One glance up into the sky over the trees in the 
Park helped her more than any human comforting. 
It was a new experience to have outgrown human 
comforting ; she thought that she had outgrown it 
that day — the last day of the year; still she must 
see Miss Jewett; it would be a rest to hear some 
one talk who did not know about Felix or that 
other time that the sunshiny eyes had brought to 
life again. Would they meet as heretofore ? Must 
they meet socially upon the street or at church? 

If it might have been that he might remain away 
for years and years — until she had wholly forgotten 
or did not care 1 

Miss Jewett was almost alone; there was no one 
with her but Sue Greyson tossing over neckties to 
find a white one with fringe. 

Through the silks there shone on the first finger 
of Sue’s left hand the sparkle of a diamond; she 
colored and smiled, then laughed and held her fin- 
ger up for Tessa’s inspection. 

“ Guess who gave it to me,” she said defiantly. 

It could not be Dr. Lake — Tessa would not speak 
his name; it must be her father — but no. Sue would 
not blush as she was blushing now; it could not 


ON THE HIGHWAY. 


171 


be Mr. Gesner ! Tessa’s heart quickened, she was 
angry with herself for thinking of Mr. Gesner. Mr. 
Towne ! But that was not possible. 

“ Can’t you guess ? ” Sue was enjoying her con- 
fusion. 

“No. I can’t guess.” 

“ Say the Man in the Moon. I as much expected 
it. It’s from Stacey ! I knew you would be con- 
founded. Wasn’t I sly about it? We are to be 
married the first day of October. We settled on 
that because it is Stacey’s birthday! It is Dr. 
Lake’s too. Isn’t it comical. Stacey is twenty- 
three and the doctor is twenty-nine I Stacey is a 
year younger than I. I wish that he wasn’t. I 
think that I shall change my age in the Bible. 
When I told Dr. Lake, he said that I seemed in- 
clined to change some other things in the Bible. 
Don’t you tell, either of you. It’s a profound se- 
cret. Wasn’t father hopping, though ? But I told 
him that I would elope if he didn’t consent like a 
good papa ; and now since Stacey’s salary is raised 
he hasn’t a bit of an excuse for being ugly about 
it. I am going to have all the new furniture, too ; 
I bargained for that. Won’t it be queer for me to 
live so far away ? Stacey is in a lace house in Phil- 
adelphia, don’t you remember? You ought to see 
the white lace sacque that he brought me for an 
engagement present ; it’s too lovely for any thing. 
Why, Tessa, you look stunned, are you speechless ? 
Don’t you relish the idea of my being married be- 
fore you ? You ought to have seen Dr. Lake when 


172 TESSA WADSWORTH^ S DISCIPLINE. 

I showed my ring to him ! lie turned as white as 
a sheet and trembled so that he had to sit down ; 
all he said was, ‘ May God forgive you.’ Don’t you 
think that it was wicked in him to say that? I 
told him that it sounded like swearing. Yes, I’ll 
take this one, please. And, oh, Tessa, I want you 
to help me to buy things. I am to have a dozen of 
every thing. I shall be married in white silk ; I told 
father that he would never have another daughter 
married so that he might as well open his long 
purse. We shall go to the White Mountains on our 
wedding tour. It’s late in the season, of course, 
but I always wanted to go to the White Mount- 
ains and I will if we are both frozen to death. I 
know that you are angry with me, but I can’t help 
it. You are just the one to believe in love. I have 
always liked Stacey; he has just beautiful hands, 
and his manners are really touching. You ought 
to see him lift his hat; Mr. Towne is nowhere.” 

“What will your father do?” asked Miss Jewett. 

“ Oh, Aunt Jane must come back, she hasn’t cap- 
tivated the widower yet; or he might get married 
himself I think that I’ll suggest it. Wouldn't it 
be fun to have a double wedding ? I’ll let father 
be married first; Stacey and I will stand up with 
them.” 

Sue went ofi* into a long, loud peal of laughter; 
Miss Jewett smiled; Tessa spoke gravely: “Sue, 
your mother would not like to hear that.” 

“ Oh, bother ! She doesn’t think of me. I want 
some silks, too, please. I shall have to make Stacey 


ON THE HIGHWAY. 


173 


a pair of slippers and a lot of other pretty things. 
And oh, Tessa, I haven’t told you the news ! The 
queerest thing! Dr. Towne — we must call him 
that now — has bought that handsome brick house 
opposite the Park and is going into practice. Dr. 
Lake says that of course people will run after him 
while they would let him starve I ” 

“ Then he’ll smell of medicine, too,” Tessa could 
not forbear suggesting. 

“Yes, and have bottles in all his pockets. I’m 
going to see your mother; she cares more about 
dress than you and Dine put together. If your 
father should die, she would be married before 
either of you. I won’t come if you look so cross 
at me.” 

At that moment Mr. Hammerton pushed open 
the door; he had come for gloves and handker- 
chiefs. Tessa selected them for him and would 
then have waited for her word with Miss Jewett, 
had not one of the clerks returned from supper. 

“Come, Lady Blue, I am going your way.” 

“Father is not well to-night; he will not play 
chess.” 

“I am going all the same, however; you shall 
play with me, and Dine shall read the ‘Nut Brown 
Maid.’ ” 

As they were crossing the Park, they met Dr. 
Lake ; he was walking hurriedly ; she could not see 
his face. 

“ What do you think Lake said to me last night ? 
We were talking — rather, he was — about trouble. 


174 TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 


He has seen a good deal of it one time and another 
I imagine ; his nerves are so raw that every thing 
hurts. For want of something to suit him in my 
own experience, I quoted a thought of Charles 
Kingsley’s. He turned upon me as if I had struck 
him — ‘A man in a book said that.’ A man in a 
book did say it, so I had nothing to say. Some- 
thing is troubling you, what is it ? ” 

“ More than one something is troubling me. I 
just heard a bit of news.” 

“ Not good news ? ” 

“ I can not see any good.” 

He repeated in a hurried tone : 

“ ‘ Good tidings every day; 

God’s messengers ride fast. 

We do not hear one half they say, * 

There is such noise on the highway 
Where' we must wait while they ride past.’ ” 

“Perhaps I do not hear one half they say this 
time; the half I do hear is troublesome enough. 
Some day, when I may begin ‘ five and fifty years 
ago,’ I will tell you a story.” 

“Will it take so long for me to become worthy 
to hear it ? ” 

“I wish I might tell you; you always help me,” 
she said impulsively. 

“ Is there a hindrance ? ” 

“ It is too near to be spoken of.” 

She was not in the mood for chess, but her 
father brightened at Mr. Hammerton’s entrance, 


ON THE HIGHWAY. 


175 


arose, threw off the shawl, and came to the table, 
saying that he would watch her moves. He seated 
himself close to her, with an arm across the back 
of lier chair, once or twice bringing his head down 
to the chestnut braids. 

“ How alike you are ! ” exclaimed Mr. Hammer- 
ton. 

“Yes, I am very pretty,” replied Mr. Wads- 
worth, seriously. 

Mrs. Wadsworth had taken her work over to 
Mrs. Bird for a consultation thereupon; Dine fell 
asleep, resting her curly head on the book that 
Mr. Hammerton had brought her. 

When Mr. Hammerton arose, Mr. Wadsworth 
went to the door with him to look out into the 
night; Tessa said good night and went up-stairs; 
the sleepy head upon the book did not stir. 

“ I never can find a constellation,” remarked Mr. 
Wadsworth. “Tessa is always laughing at me.” 

“ Step out and see if I can help you.” 

They moved to the end of the piazza leaving the 
door wide open ; the sleepy brown eyes opened with 
a start — was she listening to words- that she should 
not hear? 

Mr. Hammerton had surely said “Dinah.” And * 
now her father was saying — was she dreaming 
still? — “Take her, and God bless you both. I 
have nothing better to hope for my darling. She 
will make you a good wife.” 

“ Let it remain a secret. I want her to love me 
without any urging. She must love me because I 


176 TESSA WADSWORTH^S DISCIPLINE. 


am necessary to her and not merely because I love 
her.” 

Could Tessa have heard his voice, she would 
never again have accused him of coldness. 

“I shall have to wait — I expect an increase of 
salary. I am not sure that she thinks of me other- 
wise than as a grown-up brother — but I will bide 
my time. I know this — at least I think I do — that 
she does not care for any one else.” 

“ I am sure of that,” said her father’s voice. “You 
do not know how you have taken a burden from me, 
my son ! I have li(yped for this.” Startled little Di- 
nah arose and fled. 

She would never tell, no, not even Tessa ; but how 
how could she behave towards him as if she did not 
know ? 

“ Tessa, did you ever have a secret to keep ? ” 

“Yes. Laura told me once that she had a gold 
dollar and I’ve never told until this minute.” 

“But this is a wonderful, beautiful, happy se- 
cret; the wonderfulest and beautifulest thing in 
the world. And I shall never, never tell. You 
will never know until you discover it yourself.” 

“ I want to know something to be glad of.” 

“You will be glad of this. As glad as glad 
can be. It is rather funny that neither of us 
ever guessed; and you are quick to see things, 
too.” 

“ Perhaps I do know, pretty sister.” 

“No, you don’t. I should have seen in your 
manner. Perhaps I dreamed it; or perhaps an an- 


ON THE HIGHWAY. 


177 


gel came and told me. It is good enough for an 
angel to tell.” 

“ ‘Good tidings every day, 

God’s messengers ride fast.’ ” 

repeated Tessa. 

“Tessa,” with her face turned away, “do you like 
Gus very much ? ” 

“Do I like you very much? I should just as 
soon think of your asking me that.” 

“ Better than Felix or Mr. Towne or Dr. Lake, or 
any of the ten thousand young men in Dunellen ? ” 

“Why, Dine, what ails you? Are you asking 
my advice? He hasn’t been making love to my 
little sister, has he ? ” 

“ No,” said Dinah, “ I wonder if he knows how. 
Daisy Grey’s father is dead. There will have to be 
a new Greek professor at the Seminary. She liked 
her father.” 


XII. 

GOOD ENOUGH TO BE TRUE. 

The afternoon snn was shining down hot on the 
head of the soldier on his tall pedestal in the Park ; 
he stood leaning on his gun, his eyes intently 
peering from under the broad visor of his cap ; at 
his feet a group of children were playing soldiers 
marching to the war; at the pump, several yards 
distant, a small boy was pumping for the others to 
drink, a tall boy was lifting the rusty dipper to his 
lips while a ragged little girl was wistfully await- 
ing her turn ; nurses in white caps were rolling in- 
fants’ chaises along the smooth, wide paths ; ladies 
in shopping attire were sauntering with brown par- 
cels in their hands; half-grown boys were lolling 
on the green benches with cigars and lazy words 
in their mouths ; girls in twos and threes were stroll- 
ing along with linked arms mingling gay talk with 
gay laughter; in the arbor seven little girls and 
three little boys were playing school: a little boy 
who stammered was trying to spell Con-stan-ti-no- 
ple, a rosy child in white was noisily repeating 
“Thirty days hath Septemper,” a black-eyed boy 


GOOD ENOUGH TO BE TRUE. 


179 


was shouting “ The boy stood on the burning deck,” 
and a naughty child was being vigorously scolded 
by the teacher, who held a threatening willow 
switch above her head. “You are the dreadful- 
est child that ever breathed,” she was declaring. 
“You are the essence of stupidity, you are the 
dumbest of the dumb.” 

A serious voice arrested the willow switch : “ I 
didn’t like to be scolded when I was a little girl ; it 
used to make me cry.” 

The willow switch dropped; the various recita- 
tions came to a sudden pause. “ But she is such a 
dreadful bad girl,” urged the teacher. 

Tessa Wadsworth lingered with her reticule, 
three parcels, a parasol, and Sartor Besartus in her 
hands. 

“ You come and be teacher and tell us a story,” 
coaxed the naughty child. 

But Tessa laughed and moved on, to be stopped, 
however, by a quick call. “Tessa Wadsworth! I 
declare that you are a pedestrian.” 

The voice belonged to a pair of blue eyes, and a 
slight figure in drab. 

“Well, now that you have caught me what will 
you have ? ” 

“I’ll be satisfied with a walk across the Park. 
Didn’t you know that I was home ? Gus said that 
he would tell you.” 

“Have you had a pleasant time?” 

“ Oh, I always manage to enjoy myself How is 
it that you always stay poking at home ? ” 


180 TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 


“ I seem to have found my niche at home. Every 
one needs me.” 

“Dunellen is a poky little place, but Nan thinks 
it is splendid.” 

“ I expect to spend the winter away from home, 
and I don’t want to go. I don’t see why I must. 
Mother has been promising for years that the first 
winter that Dine was out of school I should go 
for three months, more or less, to an old aunt of 
hers for whom I was named; she has lost all her 
seven boys and lives on a farm down in the coun- 
try with the dearest old husband that ever breathed. 
If I had such a dear old husband I should always 
want to be alone with him.” 

“ That sounds just like you. I wanted Naughty 
Nan to come home with me, but she wouldn’t or 
couldn’t. You can’t think how thin she has grown, 
and she mopes like an old woman. I had to coax 
her to laugh just once for me before I came away. 
I suppose that I oughtn’t to tell, but I will tell 
you; you are as deep as the sea. You know Dr. 
Towne?” 

“Yes.” 

“Well it is all his fault,” said Mary Sherwood in 
a mysterious low voice. 

“ Did he give her something to take outwardly 
and she took it inwardly?” asked Tessa gravely. 

“That’s like you, too. You are always laugh- 
ing at somebody. How he flirted with poor little 
Naughty Nan nobody knows! ” 

“ How she flirted with him, you mean.” 


GOOD ENOUGH TO BE TRUE. 


181 ^ 


“No, I don’t. She was in earnest this time. 
He made her presents and took her everywhere; 
he always treated her as if — ” 

“ — She were his mother.” 

“I won’t talk to you,” cried Mary indignantly; 
“you don’t know any thing about it. You haven’t 
seen how white and thin she is! It’s just another 
Sue Greyson affair; and every body talks about 
how he flirted with her. I comforted Nan by say- 
ing that he had done the same thing before and 
would again.” 

“ Did that comfort her?” 

“ It made her angry. I don’t see how she can 
mourn over a man with a false heart, do you ? ” 

“ She would have no occasion to mourn over a 
man with a true heart.” 

“Do you think that he changes his mind?” 
asked Mary anxiously. 

“No, I think that he does not have any mind to 
change ; he has no mind to flirt or not to flirt ; he 
simply ei\joys himself, not caring for the conse- 
quences.” 

“ H’m ! What do you call that ? ” 

“ I do not call it any thing; it would be as well 
for you not to talk about your cousin.” 

“ So Gus said; I had to tell him. I’m afraid that 
Nan will die.” 

“No, she will not. It will make her bitter, or it 
will make her true.” 

“ Nan is so cut because people talk.” 

“When is she coming to Dunellen?” 


182 TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 


“ She wouldn’t come with me ! How I did coax 
her! She will come in September. She says that 
she will stay with me until she is married.” 

“Then she doesn’t intend to take the veil be- 
cause of this ? ” 

“She did say so — seriously — that she would enter 
a convent — ” « — ' — • 

“ A monastery I ” suggested Tessa. — ■ — 

“Where the monks are,” laughed Mary, “ I think 
that would suit her better.” 

“ And believe me — Dr. Towne is not capable of 
doing a cruel or a mean thing — don’t talk to your 
cousin about him.” 

“Oh, me! there he is now coming towards us! 
On our path, too. I’ll break the rules and run 
across the grass if you will.” 

It was certainly Ealph Towne. He was walk- 
ing slowly with his eyes bent upon the ground. 

“ He looks like a monk himself,” whispered Mary, 
“ he wouldn’t look at us for any thing.” 

“ Halt ! ” commanded the small military voice 
near the monument. He turned to look at the chil- 
dren ; Tessa was close enough to feel the sunshine 
in his eyes although his face was not towards her ; 
he stood watching the soldiers as they tramped on 
at the word of command ; her dress brushed against 
him, she could have laid her hand on his arm ; lift- 
ing her eyes with all her grief and disappointment 
at his indifference she met his fully; they were 
grave and very dark, not one gleam of recognition; 
how greatly he had changed ! His eyes appeared 


GOOD ENOUGH TO BE TRUE. 


183 


larger, not so deep set as she remembered them, 
and there were many, many white threads running 
through his hair. Had Naughty Nan effected all 
this? With a slight inclination of his head he 
passed on. 

“ He does look as if he had a ‘ mind to do or not 
do’ something,” said Mary! “I hope that he can’t 
sleep nights. He almost slew me with his eyes ; I 
can’t see why such naughty hearts should look 
through such eyes 1 ” 

“They don’t,” said Tessa, “a good heart was 
looking through those eyes.” 

“ H’m I 1 believe it I ” 

Tessa had walked three blocks in a reverie, scold- 
ing herself for her sympathy with the changed face, 
trying to feel indignant that he had passed her by 
so coolly, and trying to despise him for so soon 
forgetting what she could never forget, when, lo ! 
there he stood again, face to face with her, speak- 
ing eagerly, his hand already touching hers. 

“Miss Tessa, what has happened to your eyes?” 

“Excuse me,” she stammered, “I did not see you.” 

“ How do you do ? ” he asked more coolly as she 
withdrew her hand. 

“ Did you not just pass me in the Park ? ” 

“ I have not crossed the Park to-day.” 

“ Then I met your ghost.” 

“ Can vou not be a little glad to meet me in the 
flesh?” 

“Mary Sherwood was with me and she. recog- 
nized you ; she saw you before I did.” 


184 TESSA WADSWORTH’S DISCIPLINE. 


He laughed the low amused laugh that she had 
heard so often. “My cousin Philip will believe 
now that he might be my brother — my twin broth- 
er — but that he appears older than he is. He has 
come to Dunellen to take a professorship. He is to 
be Greek teacher at the Seminary instead of Profes- 
sor Grey. Philip is a rare linguist; he is a rare 
scholar. It is the Comedy of Errors over again. 
I suppose that he did not talk to you and say that 
he was glad to see you again.” 

“He bowed, he could not but do it. I expect 
that he thoug-ht I recognized him, as I certainly 
did. You will look like him some day, but he will 
never look like you.” 

“Your distinction is not flattering. May I ask 
a kindness of you ? ” 

“ Do you need to ask that ? ” she answered hur- 
riedly. 

“My mother is homesick in Dunellen. Will you 
call upon her ? ” 

She colored, hesitating. After a second, during 
which she felt his eyes upon her, she said, “Yes.” 

“ Philip’s father and mine were twins ; it is not 
the first time that we have been taken for each 
other. He has a twin sister.” 

“ And he is like his sister.” 

“Yes, he is like his sister. Imagine me teach- 
ing Greek or preaching in the Park — Phil is a 
preacher, of course, and an elocutionist. You will 
hear of him; he does not live in a cloister; he is 
always doing something for somebody.” 


GOOD ENOUGH TO BE TRUE, 


185 


“ He is a discipliTied man ; I never saw a person 
to whom that word could be so fitly applied.” 

“And you never thought of applying it to 
me.” 

“ I confess that I never did,” she said laughing. 

“You can see a great deal at a glance.” 

“That is why I glance.” 

“ Probably you know that I have come to Dun- 
ellen to work.” 

“I congratulate Dunellen,” she answered pret- 
tily. 

“ I hope that you may have reason to do so. 
May I tell my mother that you will call ? ” 

“Yes — if you wish,” she said, doubtfully, button- 
ing a loose button on her glove. “ Good afternoon. 
Dr. Towne.” 

She passed on at a quickened pace, her cheeks 
glowing, her eyes alight. A stranger, meeting her, 
turned for a second look. “She has heard good 
news,” he said to himself 

Had she heard good news ? She had seem the 
man that she had so foolishly and fondly believed 
Kalph Towne to be; she had learned that she could 
not create out of the longings of her own heart a 
man too noble and true for God to make out of His 
heart. Her ideal had not been too good to be true ; 
just then it was enough for her to know that her 
ideal existed. Her heart could not break because 
she was disappointed in Kalph Towne, but it would 
have broken had she found that God did not care 
to make men good and true. And Kalph Towne 


186 TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 


would become good and true some day. And then 
she would be glad and not ashamed that she had 
trusted in him; she could not be glad and not 
ashamed yet. She did not love the man that could 
trifle with Sue or flirt with Nan Gerard. She had 
loved the ideal in her heart, and not the soul in his 
flesh. He could not understand that; he would 
call it a fancy, and say that she could make rhyme 
to it, but that she could not live the poem. Per- 
haps not; if she had loved him she might have 
lived a different poem; her living and loving, her 
doing and giving, would be a poem, anyway ; she 
did not love Kalph Towne to-day, she was only 
afraid that she did. He could not understand the 
woman who would prefer Philip Towne’s saintli- 
ness; he was assured that his money would out- 
weigh it with any maiden in Dunellen — with any 
maiden but Tessa Wadsworth; he was beginning 
to understand her. “ She did not ask me to call,” 
he soliloquized. The stranger passing him also, 
gave him also a second glance, but he did not say 
to himself, “He has heard good news.” Was it 
good news that the woman that he had thought- 
lessly deceived held herself aloof from him and 
above him V 

“ She loved me once,” he soliloquized, “ and love 
with her must die a hard death.” 

How hard a death even Tessa herself could not 
comprehend; she understood years afterward when 
she said: “I thought once that I never could be as 
glad as I had been sorrowful; but I learned that 


GOOD ENOUGH TO BE TRUE. 


187 


the power to be glad was infinitely greater than 
the power of being sorrowful.” 

That evening her father called her to say: “The 
new professor is to preach Sunday evening before 
church service in the Park; you and I will go to 
hear him.” 


XIIL 

THE HEART OF LOVE. 

The day lilies were in bloom, and that meant 
August; it meant also that her book was written, 
rewritten, and ready to be copied. 

“ Oh, that my poor little book were as perfect as 
you,” she sighed one morning as she arranged them 
with their broad, green leaves for the vases in par- 
lor and sitting-room. “But God made you with 
His own fingers, and He made my book through 
my own fancies.” 

She had worked early and late, not flagging, 
through all the sultry days. “You will make 
yourself sick,” her mother had warned, “and it 
will cost you all you earn to buy beef tea and pay 
the doctor ; so where is the good of it ? ” 

She had read her manuscript aloud to her father, 
and he had laughed and wiped his eyes and given 
sundry appreciative exclamations. 

“That writing takes a precious sight of time,” 
her mother had remonstrated. 

“That is because I am human.” Tessa had an- 
swered soberly. 


THE HEART OF LOVE. 


189 


“ Suppose it is refused.” 

“Then I’ll be like William Howitt; his book was 
refused four times and he stood on London bridge 
ready to toss it over. I do not think that I will do 
as Charlotte Bronte did; she sent a rejected manu- 
script to a publisher wrapped in the wrapper in 
which the first publisher had rolled it. I suppose 
that his address was printed on it.” 

She had run on merrily as she had placed the 
cool, pure lilies in the vase ; but her heart was sink- 
ing, nevertheless. It had always taken so little to 
exhilarate or depress her. 

“ Must you write to-day ? ” inquired her mother 
one morning in an unsatisfied tone. 

“ Several hours.” 

“ I wanted you to make calls with me and to help 
me with the currant jelly and to put those button- 
holes into my linen wrapper.” 

“I can do it all, but I must write while I am 
fresh.” 

The first hour she wrote wearily ; then she lost 
the small struggles in her own life and became 
comforted through the comfort wherewith she com- 
forted others. Not one thing was forgotten, not 
one household duty shirked, the jelly was made to 
perfection, the button-holes worked while her moth- 
er was taking her afternoon nap, the calls were 
pushed through, and then Mrs. Wadsworth pro- 
posed a call upon Mrs. Towne. 

“I promised your Aunt Dinah that I would call.” 

Tessa demurred although she remembered her 


190 TESSA WADSWORTH^S DISCIPLINE. 


promise ; she much preferred calling some time 
when Aunt Dinah should be with her; Mrs. Wads- 
worth insisted and Tessa yielded more graciously 
in manner than in mind. 

Mrs. Towne received them most cordially and 
gracefully; an expression flitted over her eyes as 
Tessa looked up into them that she never forgot; 
it touched her as Dr. Lake’s eyes did, sometimes ; 
what could this beautiful old mother need in her ? 
Whatever it might be, she felt fully prepared to 
give it. * 

Mrs. Wadsworth was as effusively talkative as 
usual; Tessa replied when spoken to; lively, fussy, 
pretty little Mrs. Wadsworth did not compare to 
her own advantage with her womanly daughter. 
Mrs. Towne looked at Tessa and thought of the 
picture that she had seen; it was certainly excel- 
lent only that the picture was rather too intellect- 
ual; in the picture she might have written “Mech- 
anism of the Heavens” but sitting there in the 
crimson velvet chair with a pale blue bow among 
her braids and her soft gray veil shading her cheek 
she was more like the daughter that she had ever 
dreamed of — simple, sweet, and thoroughly lovable. 
Mrs. Towne was a trifle afraid of a woman who 
looked too intellectual. Would she forgive Ralph 
and trust him again ? She was sure that she would 
until Tessa unbuttoned her glove and drew it off; 
the slight, strong hand was a revelation; the girl 
had a will of her own. But might not her will 
be towards him? “I wish that I knew nothing,” 


THE HEART OF LOVE. 


191 


thought the mother, “the suspense will weary me, 
the disappointment will be nearly as much for me 
as for the boy.” 

Meanwhile, unconscious Tessa, with the glove in 
her fingers, was far away in the Milan cathedral 
on the wall opposite her, looking into the arches of 
the choir, feeling the sunlight through the glim- 
mering painted windows, thinking about the pro- 
cession of the scarlet-robed priests, and wondering 
about the hidden chancel; if the picture were upon 
her wall how it would glow and become alive in the 
western light, the drooping banners would stir with 
the breath of the evening, the censers would swing 
and the notes of the organ would bear her up and 
away. Away ! Where ? Was not all her world 
in this little Dunellen? 

“My son is always busy; he rushes into every 
thing that he undertakes.” 

The mother had a voice like the son’s ; the soul 
of sincerity was in it; the sincere, sympathetic 
voice, the rush of feeling, love, regret, and sense 
of loss that it brought filled her eyes too full to be 
raised. At that instant Mrs. Towne was observing 
her; her heart grew lighter, hoping for the thing 
that might be. 

Mrs. Towne held Tessa’s hand at parting. “I am 
an old woman, so I may ask a favor of a young one, 
will you come soon again?” 

“ Thanl^yoU; ves.” 

“ And often ? ’ 

Then she had to promise again. Dr. Towne was 


192 TESSA WADSWORTH^S DISCIPLINE. 


seldom at home; she thought of this when she 
promised. She was thinking of it that evening in 
the early twilight as she weeded among her pan- 
sies. Dine said that it was a wonder that she had 
not turned into a pansy herself by this time. 

“ Daughter, why do you sigh ? ” 

Her father was seated in a rustic chair on the 
piazza with a copy of Burns unopened upon his 
knee ; he had left the store earlier than usual that 
afternoon, complaining of the old pain in his side. 

“My sigh must be very loud or your ears very 
sharp,” she replied, lifting her head. “ I will bring 
you some perfect pansies.” 

He took them and looked down at them; she 
stood at his side smoothing the straggling locks 
on his bald forehead with her perfumed, soiled fin- 
gers. “ I think that if I knew nothing about God 
but that He made pansies, I should love Him for 
that,” she said at last. 

“Is that what you were sighing over? ” 

“ The sigh came out of the heart of the pansy. 
I wish I knew how to love somebody.” 

“Is that what you were sighing over ? ” 

“ I do not know how,” rubbing the soil from her 
fingers, “ to love when I lose faith. I do not know 
how and it worries me.” 

“You mean that you do not know how to honor 
and trust when you lose faith. Are you so far on 
the journey of life as that ? Mu|j; I congratulate 
you, daughter?” 

“No; teach me.” 


THE HEART OF LOVE. 


193 


“No human teaching can teach you to love 
where you have lost faith.” 

“Well; nobody asks me to!” 

“ If any body ever does, look at your own fail- 
ings; that pulls me through.” 

“I understand that,” still speaking in a troubled 
voice, “but all the love and patience do no good; 
people do not change because we love them.” 

“No, they do not change, but we change.” 

“That is not enough for me; I am not satisfied 
with the blessing of giving, I want the other some- 
body to have the blessing of receiving.” 

“We do not know the end.” 

“You two people do find queer things to talk 
about,” cried a lively voice behind them. “If I 
knew what mystical meant, I should say that it 
was you and Tessa. Don’t you want to hear all 
about Mrs. Towne, and what a lovely room we 
were taken into? ” 

“Yes, dear, and how her hair was fixed and just 
how she was dressed.” 

Tessa ran back to her pansies; Mrs. Wadsworth 
had found a theme to enlarge upon for the next 
half hour. As Tessa worked among the fiowers, a 
poem that she had learned that day while making * 
the button-holes sang itself through and through 
her heart. 

“Oh the hurt and the hurt and the hurt of love ! 

Wherever the sun shines, the waters go, 

It hurts the snowdrop, it hurts the dove, 

God on His throne, and man below. 


194 . TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 


But sun would not sMne nor waters go, 

Snowdrop tremble nor fair dove moan, 

God be on bigb, nor man below. 

But for love — the love with its hurt alone. 

Thou knowest, O, Saviour, its hurt and its sorrows, 
Didst rescue its joy by the might of Thy pain; 
Lord of all yesterdays, days, and to-morrows. 

Help us love on in the hope of Thy gain ! 

Hurt as it may, love on, love forever; 

Love for love’s sake like the Father above. 

But for whose brave-hearted Son we had never 

Known the sweet hurt of the sorrowful love.” 

> 


“I am not sincere in repeating that,” she mused. 
“I doni love on, love forever — and I don’t want 
to ! If I were in a book, every thing would make 
no difference, nothing would make a difference — 
I would love on, love forever — and I don’t know 
how. I wish I did. It would not change 7wm, but 
it would make iiie, very glad and very good! I 
can not attain to it.” 

The grazing sound of wheels brought her back 
to the pansies, then to Dr. Lake ; he had driven up 
close to the opening in the lilac shrubbery. 

“Ah, Mystic.” 

“Good evening, doctor.” 

It was the first time that they had been alone 
together since Sue’s engagement. She had been 
dreading this first time. She arose and brushed 
her hands against each other, moving towards the 
opening in the lilacs. 

“ I saw you, and could not resist the temptation 
of stopping to speak to you.” 


THE HEART OF LOVE. 


195 


“Thank you,” she said warmly. “Will you have 
a lily?” 

“No, lilies are not for me. Briers and thorns 
grow for me.” 

“ Where are you riding to now ? ” 

“Felix Harrison came home yesterday worse 
than ever. I was there in the night and am go- 
ing again. Why don’t he die now that he has a 
chance? Catch me throwing away such an op- 
portunity.” 

“ I hope that you will never have such an oppor- 
tunity,” she answered, not thinking of what she 
was saying. 

“That’s always the way; the lucky ones die, the 
unlucky ones live.” 

“Can you not resist the temptation to tell me 
any thing so trite as that ? ” 

“ Don’t be sharp. Mystic.” 

She was leaning against the low fence, her hands 
folded over each other, a breath of air stirring the 
wavy hair around her temples, and touching the 
pale blue ribbon at her throat, a white, graceful 
figure, speaking in her animated way with the 
flush of the pink rose tinting her cheeks and a 
misty veil shadowing her eyes. 

“A very pretty picture in a frame- work of brown 
and green,” thought the old man in the rustic chair 
on the piazza. 

But she never thought of making a picture of her- 
self, she left such small coquetries to girls who had 
nothing better to do or to think of. She had her 


196 TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 

life to live and her books to write ! Nevertheless 
two pairs of eyes found her pleasant to look upon. 
Dr. Lake’s experiences had opened his eyes to see 
that Tessa Wadsworth was unlike any woman that 
he had ever known; she was to him the calm of 
the moonlight, the fragrance of the spring, and the 
restfulness of trust. 

In these weeks of his trouble, had she been like 
some other of the Dunellen girls, she would have 
found her w§,y without pushing into his heart by 
the wide door that shallow Sue had left ajar. 

His heart was open to any attractive woman 
who would sympathize with him; to any woman 
who would be glad of what Sue Greyson had thrown 
away; she might have become aware of this but 
for her instinctive habit of looking upward to love ; 
even the tenderest compassion mingled with some 
admiration could not grow into love with her in 
her present moods; she was too young and asked 
too much of life for such a possibility. 

In these days every man was too far below George 
Macdonald and Frederick Kobertson, unless indeed 
it might be the new Greek professor ; in her secret 
heart she had begun to wonder if Philip Towne 
were not something like them both; perhaps be- 
cause in his sermon that Sunday twilight in the 
Park he had quoted a “declaration of Kobertson’s” 
— “I am better acquainted with Jesus Christ than 
I am with any man on earth.” 

The words came to her as she stood, to-night, 
talking with Dr. Lake ; she was wishing that she 


THE HEART OF LOVE. 


197 


might repeat them to him ; instead she only replied, 
“Why shouldn’t I be sharp ? You are a man and 
therefore able to bear it.” 

“Not much of a man — or wholly a man. I reck- 
on that is nearer right. I never saw a man yet 
that a blow from a woman’s little finger wouldn’t 
knock him over.” 

“Not any woman’s finger.” 

“ Any thing would blow me over to-night. Why 
do women have to make so many things when they 
are married ? ” he asked earnestly. 

“To keep the love they have won,” she said with 
a mischievous laugh. “Don’t you know how soon 
roses fade after they are rudely torn from the pro- 
tection and nourishment of the parent stem ? ” 

“Kudely ! They flutter, they pant, they struggle 
to tear themselves loose ! Why do you suppose that 
she prefers Stacey to me ? ” 

“ I don’t know all things.” 

“You know that. Answer.” 

“She does not prefer him. He is the smallest 
part of her calculations. Marriage with you would 
make no change in her life; she seeks change; she 
has never been married and lived in Philadelphia 
— therefore to be married and live in Philadel- 
phia must be glorious.” 

“Then if I had money to take her anywhere and 
everywhere she would have married me. I’ll turn 
highwayman to get rich then. She shows me every 
pretty thing she makes ; dresses up in all her new 
dresses and asks me if I feel like the bridegroom — 


198 TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 


lends me her engagement ring when she is tired of 
it. I’d bite it in two if I dared — reads me his letters 
and asks me to help her answer them for she can 
only write a page and a half out of her own head.” 

Tessa laughed ; it was better to laugh than to be 
angry, and Sue could not be any body but Sue 
Greyson. 

“ She says that her only objection to him is his 
name and age ; she likes my name better, and scrib- 
bles Sue Greyson Lake over his old envelopes. I 
would like to '‘send him one of them. I was read- 
ing in the paper this morning of a man who shot 
the girl that refused him ; if I don’t shoot her it will 
not be her fault, she is driving me mad. If I can’t 
have her myself, he sha’n’t.” 

She dropped her hands and turned away from 
him. 

“ Mystic.” But she was among the pansies again. 

“Mystic,” with the tone in his voice that she 
would never forget, “ come back. Don’t you throw 
me over; I shall go to destruction if you do.” 

“ I can not help you. You do not try to help 
yourself.” 

“ I know it. I don’t want to be helped. I drift. 
I have no will to struggle. She plays with me like 
a cat with a mouse. I do not know what I am 
about half the time. I will take a double dose of 
morphine some night. I wonder if she would cry 
if she saw me dead. Men have done such things 
with less provocation; men of my temperament, 
too. Would you be sorry. Mystic?” 


THE HEART OF LOVE. 


199 


She stretched out her hands to take his hand in 
both hers : “ Don’t talk so,” she said brokenly. “You 
know you do not mean it; why can’t you be brave 
and good ? I didn’t know that men were so weak.” 

“I am weak — I have strayed, I have wandered 
away — but I can go back.” 

Long afterward she remembered these words; 
they, with his last “ good-by. Mystic,” were all that 
she cared to remember among all the words that 
he had ever spoken to her. 

She did not speak ; she moved her fingers caress- 
ingly over his hand, thinking how pliant and fem- 
inine, how characteristic, it was. 

“I know a woman’s heart,” he ran on lightly; 
“ she is not a sacred mystery to me, as the fellows 
say in books. I dissected an old negro woman’s 
heart once; she died of enlargement of the heart, 
so that it was as much a study as the largest heart 
of her kind. Sue is going out to-night with Towne 
and his mother — it’s a pity that he wouldn’t step in 
now — she might let us all have a fair fight, and old 
Gesner, too, with his simpering voice ! She would 
take Gesner only he doesn’t propose. ‘ Thirty days 
hath September.’ 1 wish it had thirty thousand. 
When I was a youngster, and got a beating for not 
learning that, I little thought that one day I loould 
learn it and count the days every night. Oh, that 
rare and radiant first of October ! Do you know,” 
bending forward and lowering his tone, “ that she 
is more than half inclined to throw him over ? ” 

“ She is never more than half inclined to do any 


200 TESSA WADSWORTff^S DISCIPLINE. 


thing,” answered Tessa indignantly. “ I wish that 
he were here to keep her out of mischief. Why 
do you stay so much with her ? Surely you have 
business enough to keep you out of her presence.” 

He laughed excitedly. “ Keep a starving man 
away from bread when he has only to stretch out 
his hand and snatch it.” 

“ You have found that your doll is stuffed with 
sawdust, can’t you toss it aside ? ” 

“ I love sawdust,” he answered, comically. 

“Then I’m ’"ashamed of you.” 

“You haven’t seen other men tried.” 

“It is no honor to you to be thinking of her 
under existing circumstances.” 

“I would run away with her to-night if she 
would run with me.” 

“Then I despise you.” 

“You love like a woman. Mystic ; I love like a 
man.” 

“ i hope that no man will ever dishonor himself 
or dishonor me with love like that.” 

As he stooped to pick up his glove, his breath 
swept her cheek; she started, almost exclaiming 
as she drew back, flushed and bewildered. He 
colored angrily, then laughed an excited, reckless 
laugh, and gathered the reins which had been 
hanging loose. 

“Dr. Lake,” in a hurried, tremulous voice, “please 
don’t do that. Oh, why must you? Why can’t 
you be brave ? ” Her voice was choking with 
tears. “ I did not thmk such a thing of you.” 


THE HEART OF LOVE. 


201 


“Of course you didn’t! But I will not do it 
again — 1 really will not. I am half mad as I told 
you. Good night, Mystic.” 

“ Good night,” she said sadly. 

He held the reins still lingering. 

“Will you ride with me again some day ? ” 

“No, I don’t like to hear you talk.” 

Again she went back to her pansies; the inno- 
cent pansies with their faint, pure breath were 
more congenial. As he drove under the maples, 
he muttered words that would have startled her 
as much as his tainted breath. 

“Do you like it in this world, little pansies?” 
she sighed. 

Her father laid his book within a window on the 
sill, and came down to her to talk about the buds 
of the day-lilies; her mother fanned herself with 
a palm-leaf fan and complained of the heat; Di- 
nah ran down-stairs, fresh and airy in green mus- 
lin with a scarlet geranium among her curls, and 
after standing still to ask if she looked pretty, ran 
across to the planks to walk up and down with 
Norah Bird with their arms linked and their heads 
close together. 

Tessa sighed again, remembering the old confi- 
dential talks with Laura when they both cared for 
the same things before she had outgrown Laura. 
There were so many things in her world to be 
sighed about to-night; the thought of Felix threw 
all her life into shadow; Norah and Dinah were 
laughing over some silly thing, and her mother 


202 TESSA WADSWORTH'S DISCIPLINE. 


was vigorously waving tlie fan and vigorously 
fretting at the heat and the dust in this same 
hour in which Felix — her bright, good Felix — was 
moaning out his feeble strength. She had not 
dared to ask Dr. Lake how he was; what comfort 
would it be to know that he was a little better or 
a little worse ? How could she talk to him of her 
busy life and take him a copy of her book ? She 
was counting the days, also; for in October her 
book would surely be out. 

“You think^more of that than you would of be- 
ing married,” Dinah had said that day. 

“So I do — than to be married to any one I 
know.” 

“ Do you expect to find somebody new ? ” 

“ Perhaps I do not expect to find any one at all,” 
she had answered. 

“ Oh, don’t be so dreary,” laughed Dinah. 

Was that dreary? Once it might have seemed 
dreary; a year ago with what a smiting pain she 
would have echoed the word, but it was not a 
dreary prospect to-night as she stood with her fa- 
ther’s arm about her. 

A new thing had happened to disturb her; Di- 
nah was becoming shy and constrained in the pres- 
ence of Mr. Hammerton; last summer she would 
run out to meet him, hang on his arm and chat- 
ter like a magpie; this summer she would oftener 
avoid him than move forward to greet him; this 
shamefacedness was altogether new and very be- 
coming, yet the elder sister did not like it. There 


THE HEART OF LOVE. 


203 


was no change in Mr. Hammerton, why should 
there be change in Dinah or in herself? He came 
no oftener than he had come last summer, he man- 
ifested no preference, sometimes she thought that 
this non-manifestation was too studied; gifts were 
brought to each, were it books or flowers. Did poor 
little Dine care for him, and was she so afraid of 
revealing it ? Or, had she decided that it was for 
her sake that he came, and did she leave them so 
often together alone that it might be pleasanter 
for both ? More than once or twice when he was 
expected, she had pleaded an engagement with 
Norah, and had not appeared until late in the 
evening. 

“I wonder what’s got Dine,” their mother had 
remarked, “ she seems possessed to run away from 
Gus.” 

Their father had looked annoyed and exclaimed, 
“Nonsense, mother, nonsense.” 

Tessa’s reverie was ended by Mr. Hammerton’s 
quick step upon the planks. 

“He was here last night,” commented Mrs. 
Wadsworth as he crossed the street. 

“Good evening, good people,” he said opening 
the gate. “You make quite a picture ! If you had 
fruit and wine I should rub up my French or Span- 
ish. I think that I am not too late ; I did not hear 
until after tea that Professor Towne is to read to- 
night in Association Hall; some of your favorites, 
Lady Blue. Will you go, you and Dine ? ” 

“Oh, yes, indeed; that is just what I want.” 


204 TESSA WADSIVORTH^S DISCIPLINE. 


“It is to be selections from ‘Henry Y.,’ ‘The 
High Tide,’ ‘Locksley Hall,’ I think, and a few 
lighter things. You will think that you would 
rather elocute ‘ The High Tide ’ than even to have 
written it.” 

“ That is impossible. Did you tell Dine ? ” 

“ No, but I will. It was proper to ask the elder 
sister was it not ? ” 

“I am not Leah,” said Tessa seriously, “call 
Eachel.” 

“ Eachel ! Eachel ! ” he called, beckoning to Di- 
nah. Dinah whistled by way of reply and dropped 
Norah’s arm. 

“ Have you brought me Mother Goose or a su- 
gar-plum ? ” she asked lightly. “ And why do you 
call me Eachel ? ” 

“ Don’t talk nonsense, children,” said Mr. Wads- 
worth very gravely. The color deepened in Mr. 
Hammerton’s cheeks and forehead as he met the 
old man’s grave eyes. “Mother, let’s you and I 
go too,” proposed Mr. Wadsworth, “we will im- 
agine it to be twenty-seven years ago.” 

“ I only wish it was,” was the dissatisfied reply. 

That evening was an event in Tessa’s quiet life : 
she heard no sound but the reader’s voice, she saw 
no face but his ; she drew a long breath when the 
last words were uttered. 

“Was it so good as all that?” whispered Mr. 
Hammerton. “You shall go to the Chapel with 
me next Sunday and hear him preach about ‘ Med- 
itation.’ ” 


THE HEART OF LOVE. 


205 


Dr. Towne, his mother, and Sue Grey son were 
seated near them ; she did not observe the group 
until she arose to leave the hall. 

“Wasn’t it stupid?” muttered Sue, catching at 
her sleeve. “ And isn’t he perfectly elegant ? Al- 
most as elegant as the doctor.v” 

“You will not forget your promise?” Mrs. Towne 
said as Tessa turned towards her. 

“ Has Miss Tessa been making you a promise ? 
She does not know how to break her word,” said 
Dr. Towne. 

“You do not need to tell me that; her eyes are 
promise-keepers. ” 

Mrs. Towne kept her at her side until they 
reached the entrance and would have detained her 
until Professor Towne had made his way to them, 
had not Mr. Hammerton understood by the mov- 
ing of her lips that she was not pleased and hur- 
ried her away. 

“ I hope that I shall never become acquainted 
with Professor Towne,” exclaimed Tessa nervously, 
as Mr. Hammerton drew her hand within his arm. 

“Why not ? I thought that you were wrapped 
up in him as the young ladies say.” 

“Suppose I make a hole in him and find him 
stuffed with sawdust.” 

“You could immediately retire into a convent.” 

Dinah had mischievously fallen behind with her 
father and mother. 

“Then I could never find my good man?” 

“ Must you find him or die forlorn ? ” 


206 T£SSA WADSWORTH^S DISCIPLINE. 


For several moments she found no answer: then 
the words came deliberately; “Perhaps I med not; 
I wonder why I thought there was a must in the 
matter; why may I not be happy and helpful with- 
out ending as good little girls do in fairy sto- 
ries? I need not live or die forlorn — and yet — 
Gus, you are the only person in the whole world 
to whom I would confess that I would rather be 
like the good little girl in the fairy story ! Please 
forget it.” 

“ It is too pleasant to forget,” he answered. “ I 
do not want you to be too ambitious or too wise 
for the good old fashions of wife and mother ! ” 

“ How can any woman be that ! ” she exclaimed 
indignantly. 

“ May you never know.” 

“ What an easy time Eve had ! All she had to 
do was to be led to Adam. She would not have 
chosen him a while afterward; he was altogether 
too much under her influence.” 

“ That weakness has become a part of our orig- 
inal sin.” 

“ It isn’t yours,” she retorted. 

“Am I so different from other men?” he asked 
in a constrained voice. 

“Most assuredly. I should as soon think of a 
whole row of encyclopedias falling in love.” 

Mr. Hammerton was silent, for once repartee 
failed him. 

Suddenly she asked, “Is your imagination a trial 
to you ? ” 


THE HEART OF LOVE. 


207 


“Haven’t you often told me that I am stupid as 
an old geometry.” 

“And I hate geometry.” 

“You read, you write, you live, you love through 
your imagination. You wrap the person you love 
in a rosy mist that is the breath of your hopeful 
heart, and you see your hero through that mist. Of 
course the mist fades and you have but the ugly out- 
line — then, without stopping to see what God hath 
wrought, you cry out, ‘ Oh, the horrible ! the dread- 
ful ! ’ and run away with your fingers in your ears.” 

A few silent steps, then she said, “ I deserve that. 
It is all true. Why did you not tell me before?” 

“I left it to time and common sense.” 

“ It will take a great deal of both to make me 
sensible,” she answered humbly, and then added, 
“if suffering would root out my fancies — but I am 
like the child that tumbles and tumbles, and then 
tumbles again. I need to be guided by such a 
steady hand. Sometimes I do long so for some- 
body to do me good.” 

Her companion’s silence might be sympathetic; 
as such she interpreted it, or she could not have said 
what she never ceased wondering at herself for say- 
ing — “ I am not disappointed in love ; but I am dis- 
appointed in loving. I thought that love was once 
and forever. Poets say so.” 

“Yes, but we do not know how they live their 
poetry.” 

“I know that my poetry fails me when extremity 
comes.” 


208 TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 


“Has the extremity come?” 

“ Yes,” she said bravely. 

“And that is another thing that I am not to 
know.” 

“ Not for five and fifty years. I will pigeon-hole 
all my experiences for you — if there is no one to 
object on my side or yours.” 

“ What about the reading ? Was it all that you 
expected ? ” 

“Wait a itninute; call Dine before we talk it over.” 

They had outwalked the others; Mr. Hammer- 
ton’s strides would not be pleasant to keep pace 
with in the long walk of life, as Dinah had once 
told him. It was a truth that no one recognized so 
well as himself, that he lacked the power of adap- 
tation; he was too tall or too short, too broad or 
too narrow, too crooked or too straight for any 
niche in Dunellen, but the one that he had found in 
his boyhood by the snug, safe corner in the home 
where Dinah was growing up to entangle herself 
in his heart, and Tessa, lovable and wise, to en- 
throne herself in his intellect. In the game of for- 
feits, when he had been doomed to “ Bow to the 
wittiest, kneel to the prettiest, and kiss the one 
you love the best,” in the long ago evenings, when 
they were all, old and young, children together, he 
had always bowed to Tessa and knelt to bewitch- 
ing little Dine and kissed her. Now he bowed to 
Tessa, but he did not kiss Dine. 

They stood waiting near a lamp-post ; he, fidget- 
ting as usual, she, straight and still. 


THE HEART OF LOVE. 


209 


“ Lady Blue, you never put me on a pedestal, did 
you?” 

“No, you never kept still long enough.” 

Professor Towne passed them with Mrs. Towne 
leaning upon his arm; Mrs. Towne bowed and 
smiled, he lifted his hat in recognition of Tessa’s 
hesitating half inclination. 

“Why, Tessa ! Do you know him ? ” 

“I almost spoke to him one day by mistake ; I 
did not intend to bow, but he looked at me — I sup- 
pose the bow bowed itself.” 

“ He has a noble presence ! He is altogether 
finer physically than his cousin.” 

“I don’t know that he is,” she answered wil- 
fully. Dinah came willingly enough ; they walked 
more slowly and talked. 

“Tessa,” began Dine abruptly as they were brush- 
ing their hair at bedtime, “ isn’t Gus a fine talker ? ” 

“ Is he like Coleridge ? He could talk four hours 
without interruption, but sometimes his listeners, 
learned men too, did not understand a word of it.” 

“I do not always understand Gus.” 

“ Gus does not ramble ; he is plain enough.” 

Dine brushed out a long curl and looked down 
upon it. “ I shall ask him to give me a list of books 
that I ought to read.” 

“ I confess that while I understand what he says 
I do not understand him. If you do, you are wiser 
than I.” 

“I guess that I am wiser than you.” 

“ I used to think that I understood people ; I have 
14 


210 TESSA WADSWORTH^ S DISCIPLINE. 


come to the conclusion that I do not understand 
even my own self.” 

“ Do you like garnet ? I want a garnet in some 
material this winter. Gus says that I am a but- 
terfly.” 

“Yes, you are pretty in warm colors.” 

Tessa drew a chair to the open window and sat 
a long time leaning her elbows on the sill with her 
face towards the Harrison Homestead. Felix had 
always been so proud of the old house with its tiled 
chimney-pieces, with its ancient crockery brought 
from Holland and the iron bound Bible with the 
names of his ancestors ; for two hundred years the 
place had been held in the Harrison name, a great- 
great-grandfather having purchased the land from 
the Indians. He had said once to her, “ I have a 
good old honest name to give to you, Tessa.” She 
would have worn his name worthily for his sake; 
if it might be, — but her father would hold her back, 
— why should she not sacrifice herself? Was not 
Felix worthy of her devotion ? What other grander 
thing could she ever do ? The moon was rising ; 
she changed her position to watch it and did not 
leave it until it stood high above the apple orchard. 


XIV. 


WHEAT, NOT BREAD. 

Early one evening Tessa was writing alone in 
her own chamber; Dinah was spending a few days 
in Dunellen; while Dinah was away she wrote 
more than nsual out of her loneliness. 

Becoming wearied she laid the neat manuscript 
away and began scribbling with a pencil on a half 
sheet of foolscap ; the disconnected words revealed 
the thoughts that had been troubling her all day. 

“Counsel. Waiting. Asking. Deception. Years 
and years. Oh, I want to go to heaven.” 

A tap at the door sounded twice before it broke 
upon her reverie ; absent-mindedly she opened the 
door, but the absent-mindedness was lost in the 
flash of light that burst over her face when she rec- 
ognized, in the twilight, the one person in all the 
world whom she wished to see. 

“ Oh, I was wishing for you ! Did some good 
spirit send you.” 

“I have been feeling all day that you wanted 
me,” said the little woman suffering herself to be 
drawn into the room. “ What are you doing ? ” 


212 TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 


“Feeling wicked and miserable and wanting to 
go to heaven.” 

“You are not the kind to go to heaven, you are 
the kind to stay on earth ; what would you do in 
heaven if you do not love to do God’s will on 
earth ? ” 

Tessa drew her rocker nearer the open window 
and seated her guest in it, moved a low seat beside 
it, and sat d^wn folding her hands in her lap. 

“ What shall I do on earth ? ” she asked. 

“What you are told.” 

“I can not always see or hear what I must do.” 

“ That’s a pity.” 

“Can you?” 

“I could not once; I can now.” 

“How can you now ? ” 

“Because I desire but one thing — and that is al- 
ways made plain to me.” 

“But how can you get over wanting things ? ” 

“I can not.” 

“ I do not understand.” 

“I mean only this, dear child; I do want things, 
but I want God’s will most of all.” 

“Sometimes I think I do, and then I know that I 
do not. Do you think,” lowering her voice and 
speaking more slowly, “ that He ever deceives any 
body ? ” 

“He sometimes, oftentimes, allows them to be 
deceived, — is that what you mean ? ” 

“He does not do it.” 

“ No, but He allows others to do it.” 


tVHEAT, NOT BEE AD. 


213 


“Not — when — they pray — about it and ask what 
they may do — would He let somebody who prayed 
be deceived ? ” 

Miss Jewett was removing her gloves. She 
smoothed out each finger and thumb before she 
spoke, and laid them on the window-sill. 

“ I have been trying to think — oh, now, I know ! 
Do you not remember one whom He permitted to 
be deceived after asking His counsel ? ” 

“No. I thought the thing impossible. I do not 
see how such a thing can be.” 

“ It can be ; it has been. What for, do you sup- 
pose ? ” 

“To teach some lesson. I am learning — oh, how 
bitterly ! — that His teaching is the best of His 
gifts.” 

“So it is, child; but oh, how we have to be 
crushed before we can believe it. Is your life so 
hard ? It appears a very happy life to me.” 

“ So every one else thinks. I suppose it would 
be, but that I make my own trials ; do I make 
them? No, I don’t! How can I make things 
hard when I only do what seems the only right 
thing to do. Tell me about that somebody who 
was deceived — like me,” she added. 

“ He was a priest; he ministered before the Lord, 
and he believed in David, because he was an hon- 
orable man, and high in the king’s household; so 
when David came to him and said : ‘ The king hath 
commanded me a business, and hath said unto me, 
Let no man know it,’ of course, he believed him. 


214 TESSA WADSWORTH'S DISCIPLINE. 


and when he asked him for bread the old priest 
would have given it, not thinking that in harbor- 
ing the king’s son-in-law he was guilty of trea- 
son; but he had no bread; he had nothing but 
the shew-bread, which only the priests might eat. 
He did not dare give him that until he asked coun- 
sel of the Lord. No priest had ever dared before, 
and how could he dare ? But David and his men 
were starving, they dared go to no one else for 
help; but the priest didn’t know that, poor, old, 
trustful man, so he asked counsel, and having ob- 
tained permission, he gave to David the hallowed 
bread. That was right, because our Lord approves 
of it; then David asked for Goliath’s sword, and he 
gave him that, and went to sleep that night as 
sweetly as the night before, I have no doubt, be- 
cause he had asked counsel of the Lord and fol- 
lowed it.” , 

“Did any harm come to him?” asked Tessa, 
quickly. 

“ Harm ! He lost his head ; Saul slew him for 
treason; and he pleaded before the king: ‘And who 
is so faithful among all thy servants as David, 
which is the king’s son-in-law, and goeth at thy 
bidding, and is honorable in thine house?’ God 
could have warned him or have brought to his ears 
the news that David was an outlaw, but He suf- 
fered him to be deceived and lose his life for trust- 
ing in the man who was telling him a lie.” 

After a silence Tessa said: “He Jiad to obey! 
I’m glad that he obeyed ; I believe that was written 


WHEAT, NOT BREAD. 


215 


just for me. I asked God once to let somebody 
love me, and I trusted him, because I thought that 
God had given him to me — and it has broken my 
heart with shame. I did not know before that He 
let me be deceived; I knew that I was obeying 
Him, but I thought that my humiliation was my 
punishment for doing I knew not what.” 

“ Now I know the secret of some of your articles 
that I have cried over ; not less than ten people told 
me how much they were helped by that article of 
yours, ‘ Night and Day.’ ” 

“ I have three letters that I will show you some- 
time ; I know that my trouble has worn a channel 
in my heart through which God’s blessing flows ; 
except for that I should have almost died.” 

“You do not look like dying; your eyes are as 
clear as a bell, and there’s plenty of fun in you yet.” 

“The fun and sarcasm are a little b[t sanctified, 
I think; I never say sharp things nowadays.” 

“ Perhaps the answer to your prayer has not all 
come yet ; sometimes the answer is given to lis to 
spoil it or use as we please, just as the mother gives 
the child five cents in answer to his coaxing, and 
the hap or mishap of it is in his hands. Perhaps 
He has given you the wheat, and you must grind 
it and bake it into bread; be careful how you grind 
and how you knead and bake ! To some people, 
like Sue Greyson, He gives bread ready baked, but 
you can receive more, and therefore to you He 
gives more — more opportunity and more discipline. 
To be born with a talent for discipline, Tessa, is a 


216 TESSA WADSWORTH’S DISCIPLINE. 


wonderful gift, and oh, how such have to be taught ! 
Would you rather be like flighty Sue ? ” 

“No, oh, no, indeed,” shivered Tessa, “ but she 
can go to sleep when I have to lie awake.” 

“ Now I must go.” 

“ I’ll walk to the end of the planks with you.” 

Tessa was too much moved to care to talk; the 
walk with Mjss Jewett was almost as silent as her 
walk homeward alone. 


XV. 


SEPTEMBER. 

If Miss Jewett had not been once upon a laugh- 
ing time a girl herself, she would have wondered 
where the girls in Dunellen found so much to 
laugh about. Nan Gerard laughed, Sue Grey son 
laughed, and Tessa Wadsworth laughed ; they 
laughed separately, and they laughed together; 
they cried separately, too, but they did not cry 
together. Nan knew that it was September, be- 
cause she had planned to come to Dunellen in Sep- 
tember; Sue knew, because so few days remained 
before her wedding-day; and Tessa knew, because 
she found the September golden rod and pale, fall 
daisies in her long walks towards Mayfield; she 
knew it, also, because her book was copied and at 
the publishers’, awaiting the decision over which 
she trembled in anticipation night and day. One 
morning, late in the month, she found at the post- 
office a long, thick, yellow envelope, containing 
two dozens of pictures; several of them she had 
seen long ago in Sunday-school books ; those that 
were new to her, appeared cut or torn from some 
book ; the letter enclosed with the pictures re- 


218 TjESSA WADSIVORTH^S DISCIPLINE. 


quested her to write a couple of books and to use 
those pictures. 

“I’ve heard of illustrating books,” she laughed 
to herself, “ but it seems that I must illustrate 
pictures.” 

Coaxing Miss Jewett into her little parlor, she 
showed her ‘the pictures, and read aloud the letter. 

“ I think it is a great compliment to you,” said 
the little woman, admiringly. “You do not seem 
to think of that.” 

“Father will think so. You and he are such 
humble people, that you think me exalted! Wo- 
men have become famous before they were as old 
as I.” 

“You may become famous yet.” 

“It isn’t in me. Genius is bold; if it were in 
me, I should find some way of knowing it. My 
work is such a little bit, such a poor little bit. 
But I do like the letter.” 

“You will be glad of it when you are old.” 

“ I am glad of it now.” 

She read it again: the penmanship was strag- 
gling and ugly. 

“ I do not know how to talk to you; you remind 
me of Tryphena and Tryphosa; St. Paul would 
know what to say to you. You seem to have no 
worldliness in your aims. Your style is impres- 
sive. I think that we can keep your pen busy. 
Your last manuscript is still in the balance.” 

“If it be found wanting, what shall I do! The 
suspense wears upon me.” 


SEPTEMBER. 


219 


I begin to understand why mediocrity is long- 
lived. Don’t be a goose, child.” 

Mr. Wadsworth was at his desk; he read the 
letter through twice without comment. 

“Well ! ” she said, playing with a morsel of pink 
blotting paper. 

“ It’s heautifvl:, daughter.” 

She wondered why it did not seem so much to 
her as it did to him and to Miss Jewett. 

“ I expect that Dine will take to authorship 
next.” 

Tessa’s lips were keeping a secret, for Dine was 
writing a little story. When had she ever failed 
to attempt the thing that Tessa had done? She 
had not taken Tessa’s place in school, and had been 
graduated much nearer the foot of her class than 
Tessa had ever stood ; still she had Tessa’s knack 
of writing stories, and telling stories, and had, at 
her urging, written a story for boys, which Tessa 
had criticised and copied ; Dinah’s penmanship 
being very pretty, but not at all plain. The let- 
ter made no allusion to the fate of Dinah’s story; 
somewhat anxious about this, she slipped the bulky 
envelope into her pocket and turned her face home- 
wards. Her winter’s work was laid out for her; 
there was nothing to do but to do it. 

So full was she with plans for the books that she 
did not hear steps behind her and at her side until 
Sue Greyson nudged her. 

“Say, Tessa, turn down Market Street with me; 
I have something to tell you.” The serious, star- 


220 TESSA WADSWORTH’S DISCIPLINE. 

tied voice arrested her instantly. What new and 
dreadful thing had Sue been doing now? Her 
only dread was for Dr. Lake. 

“I’ve been ordering things for dinner; we have 
dinner at four, so I can afford to run around town 
in the morning. I’m in a horrid fix and there’s 
nobody to help me out.” 

“ What about ? ” 

“/haven’t been doing any thing; it’s other peo- 
ple ; it’s always other people,” she said plaintively, 
“somebody is always doing something to upset 
my plans. You do not sympathize with me, you 
never do.” 

“I do not know how to sympathize with any 
thing that is not straightforward and true, and 
your course is rather zigzag.” 

“ Dr. Towne said — ” 

“You haven’t been talking to Hm,” interrupted 
Tessa, flushing. 

“No, only he called to see father and I was home 
alone and he asked me what ailed me and I had to 
tell him that I didn’t want to be married.” 

“ Well, what could he say ? ” 

“ He said, ‘ Stay with your father and be a good 
girl,’ ” laughed Sue, “ the last thing I would think 
of doing. Father looks so glum and says, ‘ Oh, my 
little girl, what shall I do without you ! I wish 
that fellow was at the bottom of the sea ! ’ So do 
I, too. I don’t see why I ever promised to marry 
him ! I think that I must have been bereft of my 
senses.” 


SEPTEMBER. 




“Why not ask him to wait a year — you will 
know your own mind — if you have any — by that 
time.” 

“ Oh, deary me ! I’d be married to John Gesner 
or some other old fool with money by that time ! 
You don’t mind being an old maid, but / do ! ” 

“ How do you know that I don’t mind ? ” Tessa 
could not forbear asking. 

“ Oh, you wouldn’t be so happy and like to do 
things. I believe that I like Gerald a great deal 
better any way.” 

She grew frightened at Tessa’s stillness; there 
was not one sympathetic line in the stern curving 
of her lips. 

“ Have you told Dr. Lake that? ” 

“You needn’t cut me in two,” laughed Sue un- 
easily, “ men can’t sm women for breach of promise 
can they ? ” 

“Answer me, please.” 

Sue hesitated, colored, stammered, finally .con- 
fessed in a weak voice that tried hard to be brave, 
“ Yes, I have ! There now ! You can’t hurt me ! 
Father said last night that if I had taken Lake he 
would have given me the house and every thing 
in it ‘ for the old woman to keep house with,’ you 
know ! And then he said that it was hard for me 
to leave him now that he is growing old, that he 
would have to marry somebody that wouldn’t care 
for him, that he never had had much pleasure in 
his life, that Gerald was a good physician and they 
could work together and how happy we might all 


222 TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 

have been ! He was mad enough though when he 
first discovered that Gerald was in love with me ; 
he threatened to send him off. But that’s his way ! 
He is one thing one day and another thing the 
next ! And I couldn’t help it, Tessa, I really, real- 
ly couldn’t, but I was so homesick and just then 
Gerald came in — he looked so tired, his cough has 
come back, too — and when he said ‘ How many 
days yet, Susan?’ I said quick, before I thought, 
‘ I like you a hundred times better ! I would rather 
marry you than Stacey.’ And then he turned so 
white that I thought he was dead, and he said 
something, I don’t know whether it was swearing 
or praying — and caught me in his arms, and said 
after that he would never let me go ! And then I 
said — I said — I couldn’t help it — that I would write 
to Stacey and send back the ring and he took it off 
and tossed it out the window ! And then I made 
him go and find it! Stacey can give it to some 
other girl. I didn’t hurt it. I always took it off 
when I swept or wet my hands. Life is so uncer- 
tain, I thought that he might want it again.” 

“ Life is uncertain. I never realized it until this 
minute.” 

“Now your voice isn’t angry,” said poor Sue 
eagerly. “ I want you to think that I have done 
right.” 

“When my moral perceptions are blunted, I 
will.” 

“ Go away, saying ‘ moral perceptions.’ I don’t 
know what Dr. Towne will think either. Well, 


SEPTEMBER. 


223 


what’s did can’t be undid ! Now Gerald says that 
I sha’n’t put it off, but that I’ve got to marry him 
on that day. I know that you think it is horrid, 
but you never have lovers, so you don’t know ! I 
don’t see why, either. You are a great deal pret- 
tier than I am. When I am tired, I am the look- 
ingest thing, but you always look sweet and peace- 
ful. Don’t you think that I ought to please father 
and stay home ? Why don’t you say something ? 
Are you struck dumb ? ” 

“ I can not understand it — yet.” 

“I think that I have made it plain enough,” cried 
Sue, angrily. “You must be very stupid. You like 
Gerald so much — I used to be jealous — that you 
ought to be glad for him ! ” 

“ I do like him. I like him so well. Sue, that I 
want him to have a faithful and true wife. 0, Sue ! 
Sue Greyson! What are you to take that man’s 
life into your hands ? ” 

“ I don’t know what you mean. I love him, of 
course ! If you think so much of him, why don’t 
you marry him ? ” 

“ The question is not worth a reply.” 

“You ought to comfort me; I haven’t any moth- 
er,” returned Sue, miserably. 

“ It is well for her that you haven’t.” 

“ I don’t see why you can’t let me be comfort- 
able,” whined Sue; “every thing would be lovely 
if you didn’t spoil it all. Gerald is as wild as a 
lunatic. He shall write to Stacey or father shall, 
or I’ll be married beforehand and send him the 


224 TESSA WADSWORTH'S DISCIPLINE. 

paper. I could do it in ten days. Do come home 
with me, I want you to see my wedding dress! 
It’s too lovely for any thing. My travelling dress 
is an elegant brown ; I got brown to please Stacey, 
but Gerald likes it.” 

“ It’s a good idea to choose a color that gentle- 
men like generally; life is so uncertain.” 

“So it is,” replied Sue, unconsciously. “I think 
that you might congratulate me,” she added, with 
her hysterical laugh. “You didn’t think that your 
gold thimble would make pretty things for Dr. 
Lake’s wife, did you ? ” 

“I congratulate you! I hope that I may con- 
gratulate him, in time. Dr. Lake is trying to 
pour a gallon into a half pint. I hope that one 
of you will die before you make each other very 
miserable.” 

“ You mean thing,” said Sue, almost crying. 

“I do not mean to hurt you. Sue, but you are 
doing something that is wretched beyond words. 
Don’t you care at all for that poor fellow who loves 
you.” 

“Gerald loves me, too,” she answered proudly. 
“ You are ugly to me, and I haven’t any body that 
I dare talk to but you. Mary Sherwood says that 
telling you things is like throwing things into the 
sea; nobody ever finds them.” 

“I must be very full of rubbish.” 

“We are going to Washington on our bridal 
trip; we can’t stay long, for father will not spare 
Gerald. I shall ask nobody but Dr. Towne and his 


SEPTEMBER. 


225 


mother, and Miss Jewett, and you, and Dine. Will 
you come ? ” she asked hesitatingly. 

“ I will come for Dr. Lake’s sake.” 

“I got a letter from Stacey this morning. I 
haven’t opened it yet; it will make me very sad. 
I wish that I wasn’t so sensitive about things. It’s 
a dreadful trouble to me. I looked in the glass the 
first thing this morning expecting that my hair 
would be all white. I’m dying to show you my 
things; do come home with me.” 

“ Sue, do you ever say your prayers? ” 

“To be sure I do,” she replied, with a startled 
emphasis. 

“Then be sure to say them before you write to 
that poor fellow.” 

“ I wish that you would write for me. Will you 
come the night before and stay all night with me ? 
I shall be so afraid that the roof will tumble in, or 
somebody come down the chimney to catch me, 
that I sha’n’t sleep a wink.” 

The curves of Tessa’s lips relented. “Yes, I will 
come. If somebody come they shall catch me, too.” 

“You are a darling, after all. We are to be mar- 
ried about noon; Day is to send in the breakfast 
and the waiters — that was the plan, and if father 
isn’t too mad, I suppose he’ll do the same now.” 

She stood still at the corner. “Well, if I do not 
see you — good-by till the last night of your girl- 
hood.” 

“Last night of my girlhood,” repeated Sua 
“What are the other hoods?” 

15 


226 T£SSA WADSWORTH^ S DISCIPLINE. 


“ Womanhood.” 

“ Oh, yes, and widowlioodj' she said lightly. 

Tessa turned the corner and walked rapidly 
along the pavement. “ Motherhood,” she was think- 
ing, “ the sweetest hood of all ! But I can sooner 
think of that in connection with a monkey or a 
butterfly than with Sue.” 

At the next corner another interruption faced 
her in the forms of Mary Sherwood and laughing 
Naughty Nan. 

The lively chat was ended with an expostulation 
from Nan. “Now, Mary Sherwood, hurry. You 
know that I must do several things this afternoon. 
I’m going to Mayfleld and Green Valley with the 
handsome black bear. Miss Wadsworth.” 

It was the day for her afternoon with Mrs. Towne ; 
it had chanced that she had given to her every 
Tuesday afternoon. It touched her to find the 
white-haired, feeble, old lady watching for her at 
the window. Tessa loved her because she was cul- 
tured and beautiful; she loved her voice, her shape- 
ly, soft hands, her pretty motions, her elegant and 
becoming dress, and because — 0, foolish Tessa, for 
a reason that she had tossed' away, scorning her- 
self — she was Kalph Towne’s mother. Not once in 
all these times had she met Dr. Towne in his own 
home ; not until this afternoon in which he was to 
take Miss Gerard driving. 

“ My mother is engaged with callers. Miss Tessa ; 
she asked me to take you to her sitting-room, and 
to take care of you for half an hour.” 


SEPTEMBER, 


227 


“ I am sorry to trouble you,” said she confusedly. 
“ I want to see Miss Jewett; I will return in half 
an hour.” 

“And not give me the pleasure of the half hour? 
When have you and I had half an hour together ? ” 

She remembered. 

“On the last night of the old year, was it not? 
Come with me and ‘take off your things.’ Isn’t 
that the thing to say?” 

Unwillingly she followed him ; he wheeled a 
chair into one of the wide windows overlooking 
the Park, laid away hat, sacque, and gloves, then 
seated himself lazily in the chair that he had 
wheeled to face her own. It was almost like the 
afternoons in the shabby parlor at home; so like 
them that she could not at first lift her eyes ; in a 
mirror into which she had glanced, she had noticed 
how very pale lips and cheeks were and how dark 
her eyes were glowing. 

He bent forward in a professional manner and 
laid two fingers on her throbbing wrist. “Miss 
Tessa, what are you doing to lose flesh so ? ” 

With that, she lifted her eyes, the color coming 
with a rush. “Wouldn’t you like to see my tongue, 
too?” 

“I know your tongue; it has a sharp point.” • 

“ I am sorry.” 

“No you are not,” he answered settling himself 
back in an easy position, and taking a penknife 
from his pocket to play with. The small knife, 
with the pearl handle ; how often she had seen that 


228 TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE, 


in his fingers. “ You are a student of human na- 
ture; tell me what you think of me.” 

How could she give to that amused assurance 
the bare, ugly truth ! 

“ How many times have you changed your mind 
about me?” 

“Once, only once.” 

“Then your first impression of me was not 
correct.” 

With her usual directness, she answered, “No.” 

The blade snapped. If she had seen but his face 
she would have supposed that he had cut himself. 
She hastened to speak: “Some one says that we 
must change our minds three times before we can 
be sure.” 

“But I do not want to wait until you are sure.” 

“I am sure now.” 

“No doubt. Tell me now.” 

How many times his irresistibly boyish manner 
had forced from her words that she had afterward 
sorely regretted ! 

“You will not be pleased. You will dislike me 
forever after.” 

“Much you will care for that.” 

“Shall I not?” smiling at the humor in his eyes. 
“ I think that I do not care as I once did for what 
people think of me ; the question nowadays is what 
I think of them.” 

“I will remember,” he said urgently, “that I 
brought it all upon my own head.” 

How could he guess that in her heart was lodged 


SEPTEMBER. 


229 


one unpleasant thought of him ? Had she not a lit- 
tle while — such a little while since — cared so much 
for him that he was grieved for her? 

“You must promise not to be cross.” 

“I promise,” taking out his watch. “You may 
hammer at me for twenty minutes. I have an en- 
gagement at half past three.” 

Did Nan Gerard care as she had cared once? 
Would the sound of his wheels be to Naughty Nan 
what they were to her a year ago ? A blue and 
gold edition of Longfellow was laid open on its 
face on the broad window-sill; she ran her forefin- 
ger the length of both covers before she could 
temper her voice ; she did not wish to speak cold- 
ly, and yet her heart was very cold towards him. 

“I think that you took me by surprise at first; 
I thought you were the handsomest man in the 
world—” 

“You have changed that opinion?” he said, 
laughing. 

“Yes; I should not think of describing you as 
handsome now; I should simply say that you were 
tall, dark, with deep-set, not remarkable, brown 
eyes, a quiet manner, given to few words — not at 
all remarkable, you are aware.” 

“ Go on. I am not demolished yet.” 

“Your spirit I created out of my own fancies; I 
gave you in those enthusiastic days a heart like a 
woman’s heart, and a perfect intellect. You were 
my Sir Galahad, until I knew that some things 
you said were not — quite true ? ” 


230 TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE, 


“Not quite true!” he repeated huskily. 

Her eyes as well as her fingers were on the blue 
covers. 

“Not true as I meant truth. Your words did 
not mean to you what they meant to me — I beg 
your pardon; do not let me savor of strong-mind- 
edness, but I speak from my heart to your heart. 
You asked me a question frankly, I have answered 
it frankly. You said some things to Sue that you 
ought not to have said and that hurt me ; I began 
to feel that you are not sincere through and through 
and through. At first I believed wholly in you 
and then I believed not at all. I was very bitter. 
And it hurt me so that I would rather have died.” 

Her tone was as cold and even as if she were re- 
citing a theorem in Legeiidre. 

“So you died because you were not true, but you 
did not go to heaven because you had never lived, 
and therefore I can not expect to find you again. 
I did not know before how sad such a burial is.” 

“ Why can not you expect to find me again ? ” 

“To find what? That fancy? If there is any 
one in the world as good, as true, as strong, gentle 
and sympathetic as my ideal, I surely hope to find 
that he is in the world.” 

“You thought that his name was Kalph Towne, 
and now you know that his name is not Ralph 
Towne.” 

“I do not know what his name may be.” 

“You think the real Ralph Towne is a stranger 
not worth knowing ? ” 


SEPTEMBER. 


231 


“He is a stranger, certainly; whether or not he 
is worth knowing you know best.” 

She laughed, but not the suspicion of a smile 
gleamed in his eyes; she had forgotten that they 
could be as dark and stern as this. 

“Time will show you. Miss Tessa,” he said hum- 

Wy- 

“I am sharp. I did not mean to be. But it (Ms 
me so when I think that you can flirt with girls 
like Sue and Miss Gerard. Do you know of what 
it reminds me ? Once the enemy fell upon the 
rear of an army and smote all that were feeble, 
when they were faint and weary ; it was an army 
of women and little children, as well as men, and 
they did not go forth to war; all they asked was a 
peaceable passage through the land.” 

The door was pushed softly open; Tessa lifted 
her eyes to behold the rare vision of shining gray 
silk, and real lace, a flne face crowned with white 
braids and lighted by the softest and brownest of 
brown eyes. 

“My dear.” All her motherhood was concen- 
trated in the two worn out words. 

“ Now you may run away, Kalph.” 

“ I am very glad to,” he said. “ Good afternoon, 
Miss Tessa.” 

Tessa could not trust her voice to speak; raising 
her eyes she met his fully as he turned at the door 
to speak to his mother; a long searching look on 
both sides; neither smiled. 

“Tessa, have you been quarrelling with my boy?” 


232 TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 


“No, ma’am.” 

“Has he been quarrelling with you?” 

“No, ma’am.” 

Mrs. Towne seated herself in the chair that Dr. 
Towne had vacated, arranged her dress and folded 
her hands in her lap. 

“It is Nan Gerard again ! What a flirt that girl 
is! She called yesterday and Ralph chanced to 
come in while she was here ; she gave him such an 
invitation to invite her to drive with him that he 
could not — that is, he did not — refuse. I wish that 
he wouldn’t, sometimes; but he says that he is 
amused and no one is harmed. I am not so sure 
of that. I do not understand Miss Gerard. I think 
that I do not understand girls of this generation. 
But I understand you.” 

“I wish that you would teach me to be as 
wise.” 

“You will be by and by. Do you know what I 
would like to ask you to promise ? ” 

“ I can not imagine.” 

“I have studied you. If you will give yourself 
five years to think, to grow, you will marry at 
thirty the man that you would refuse to-day. You 
are impetuous to-day, you form your judgments 
rashly, you despise what you can not understand, 
and you are not yet capable of the love that hopeth 
all things, endureth all things, that sufiereth long 
and is land'' 

“That is true; I am not capable of it. I have no 
patience with myself, nor with others.” 


SEPTEMBER. 


233 


“If you will wait these five years, your life and 
another life might be more blessed.” 

“ Mrs. Towne ! No one loves me. There is no 
occasion for me mt to wait. I could promise with- 
out the least difficulty for the happiness or unhap- 
piness of marriage is as unattainable to me to-day 
as the happiness or unhappiness of old age.” 

“ I will not ask you to promise, my daugh- 
ter, but I will ask you to promise this; before 
you say to any man, ‘Yes,’ will you come to me 
and talk it all out to me? As if I were really 
your mother ! ” 

Tessa promised with misty eyes. 

“I promised to show you an old jewel-case this 
afternoon,” said Mrs. Towne in a lighter tone. “I 
wish that I might tell you the history of each 
piece.” She brought the box from a small table 
and pushed her chair nearer Tessa that she might 
open it in her lap. “This emerald is for you,” she 
sai^, slipping a ring containing an emerald in old- 
fashioned setting upon the first finger of Tessa’s 
left hand; “and it means what you have promised. 
All that your mother will permit me, I give to you 
this hour.” 

“You are very kind to me.” 

“ I am very kind to myself All my life I have 
wanted a daughter like you ; a girl with blue eyes 
and a pure heart ; one who would not care to fiirt 
and dress, but who would love me and talk to me 
as you talk to me. I am proud of my boy, but I 
want a daughter.” 


234 TESSA WADSWORTH'S DISCIPLINE. 


“ I am not very good ; you may be disappointed 
in me.” 

“ I do not fear that. This, my mother gave me,” 
lifting pin and ear-rings from the box. A diamond 
set in silver formed the centre of the pin ; the dia- 
mond was surrounded by pearls of different sizes. 
“I was very proud of this pin. I did not know 
then that I could not have every thing in the world 
and out of it. Tliis pin my father gave me.” 

Tessa laid it in her hand and counted the dia- 
monds ; it was a diamond with nine opals radiating 
from it, between each opal a small diamond. “ It 
looks like a dahlia,” she said. “ I love pretty things. 
This ring is the first ring that I ever had.” 

“ People say that the emerald means success in 
love,” replied Mrs. Towne. “ I did not remember 
it when I chose that for you. Perhaps you would 
prefer a diamond.” 

“ I like best what you chose,” said Tessa, taking 
from among the jewels, bracelet, pin, ear-rings ji,nd 
chatelaine of turquoises and pearls, and examining 
each piece with interested eyes. “These are old, 
too.” 

“ Every thing in this box is old. Some day you 
shall see my later jewels. You will like this,” she 
added, placing in her hands a bracelet formed of a 
network of iron wire, clasped with a medallion of 
Berlin iron on a steel plate; the necklace that 
matched it was also of medallions; the one in the 
centre held a bust of Psyche ; upon the others were 
busts of men and women whom Tessa did not rec- 


SEPTEMBER. 


235 


ognize; to this set belonged comb, pin, and ear- 
rings. 

“ These belonged to my mother. How old they 
are I do not know. See this ring, a portrait of 
Washington, painted on copper, and covered with 
glass. It is said to be one of the finest portraits in 
the country. I used to wear it a great deal. My 
father gave it to me on my fifteenth birthday. 
Have I told you that Lafayette kissed me when I 
was an infant in my mother’s arms ? ” 

While Tessa replaced the treasures with fingers 
that lingered over them, with the new weight of 
the emerald upon her finger, and the new weight 
of a promise upon her heart, Mrs. Towne related 
the story of the kiss from Lafayette. 

Tessa was a perfect listener, Mrs. Towne thought ; 
the lighting or darkening of her eyes, a flush rising 
to her cheeks now and then, the curving of the 
mobile lips, an exclamation of surprise or apprecia- 
tioi^ were most grateful to the old heart that , had 
found after long and intense waiting the daughter 
that she could love and honor. 

In the late twilight Dr. Towne returned; Tes- 
sa was still listening, with the jewel-case in her 
lap. 

“I have missed my husband with all the old 
loneliness since we came into Dunellen,” she was 
saying when her tall son entered and stood at her 
side. 

“Mother,” he said, in the shy way that Tessa 
knew, “ you forget that you have me.” 


236 TESSA WADSWORTH^ S DISCIPLINE. 


“No, son, I do not forget; but your life is full of 
new interests. Yesterday I did not have ten min- 
utes alone with you.” 

“ It shall not happen again.” 

“ I have persuaded Tessa to stay and hear Philip 
to-night; she says that he is like a west wind to 
her.” 

“ He would not fall upon the hindmost in your 
army. Miss Tessa.” 

“ I am sure that he would not.” 

“Not if they coaxed him to?” 

“He should have manliness enough to resist all 
their pretty arts, and enticing ways.” 

“Mother, can’t you convince her? She has been 
rating me soundly for flirting, when it is the girls 
that are flirting with me.” 

“It takes two to flirt,” replied his mother. 

Dr. Towne was sent for as they were rising from 
the dinner table ; Mrs. Towne and Tessa crossed the 
Park alone ; at the entrance of the Lecture Room 
Sue Greyson met them. 

“ I had to come,” Sue whispered, seizing Tessa’s 
arm. “ Father is so horrid and hateful, and said aw- 
ful things to me just because I asked him to write 
to Stacey. The letter is written anyhow, and I’m 
thankful it’s over. Father says that he won’t give 
me the house, and that I sha’n’t be married under 
his roof He is mad with Gerald, too, and told 
him to leave his house. So Gerald left and went 
to see a patient. He is so happy that he don’t care 
what father says.” 


SEPTEMBER. 


237 


As they passed down the aisle, Tessa’s dress 
brushed against Felix Harrison ; he was sitting 
alone with his father. 

“Why! Felix Harrison! Did you ever?” whis- 
pered irrepressible Sue. 

The Lecture Koom was well-lighted, and well- 
filled. Professor Towne was the fashion in Dun- 
ellen. During the opening prayer there was a stir 
in one of the pews behind Tessa; she did not lift 
her head, her heart beat so rapidly that she felt as 
if she were suffocating. 

“Poor fellow,” came in Sue’s loud whisper close 
to her ear. “They have taken him out! I should 
think that he would know better than to go among 
folks.” 

Tessa could not follow the speaker for some min- 
utes; the lights went out, she could not catch her 
breath; Mrs. Towne took her hand and held it 
firmly, then the lights came dim, through a misty 
and waving distance, her breath was drawn more 
easily, she could discern the outline of the preacher, 
and then his dark face was brought fully into view, 
his voice sounded loud in her ears; for some time 
longer she could not catch and connect his words ; 
then, clear and strong, the words fell from his lips, 
and she could listen and understand — 

“ Good is the will of the Lord concerning me.” 

If Felix could have listened and understood, would 
he have been comforted, too? 

His voice held her when her attention wavered ; 
afterward, that one sentence was all that had fas- 


238 TESSA WADSWORTH'S DISCIPLINE. 


tened itself; and was not that enough for one life- 
time? 

At the door, Dr. Towne stood waiting for his 
mother, and Mr. Hammerton and Dinah were mov- 
ing towards the group. 

“ I knew that you would be here,” said Dinah, 
“so I coaxed Gus away from father. I couldn’t 
wait to tell you that your books have come. Two 
splendid dozens in all colors; I had to open them. 
You don’t mind? Gus and I each read a brown 
one ; we think the crimson and blue ones must be 
splendid.” 

Sue drew Tessa aside to coax in her plaintively 
miserable voice, “ Come home with me ; father will 
say things, and I shall be afraid.” 

“I can’t help you. Sue.” 

“You mean you xoarit I’ll elope with Dr. Lake, 
and then Dunellen will be on fire, and you don’t 
care.” 

“I’m not afraid. He has ^ood sense, if you 
haven’t.” 

“I’ll come and see you to-morrow, then.” 

“Well, that will do.” 

“Nobody ever had so much trouble before,” sighed 
Sue as she went off. 

Mr. Hammerton was in high glee and teased 
Tessa all the way home about her book. 

“The milk pails were on the fence twice. Lady 
Blue, that is tautology.” 

“ Oh, they kept them there.” 

“And the grandmother was always knitting.” 


SEPTEMBER. 


239 


“She always did knit.” 

“Lady Blue, you are on the road to Poverty; he 
who walks the streets of Literature will stop at the 
house of Starvation. Homer was a beggar; Terence 
was a slave ; Tasso was a poor man ; Bacon Avas as 
poor as a church mouse; Cervantes died of nothing 
to eat. Are you not beginning to feel the pangs of 
hunger? Breath and memory fail me, or I would 
convince you. Collins died of neglect; Milton was 
an impecunious genius; every body knows how 
wretchedly poor Goldsmith was; and wasn’t poor 
old prodigious Sam Johnson hungry half his life? 
Chatterton destroyed himself I tremble for you, 
child of Genius! Auther of ‘Under the Wings,’ 
what hast thou to say in defence of thy mad 
career?” 

“Don’t mind him, Tessa,” consoled Dinah, “he 
does like your book; he said that he had no idea 
that you could do so well; that there was great 
promise in it, that it revealed a thoughtful mind — 
he said it to father — that the delineation of charac- 
ter was fine, and that it had the real thing in it. 
What is the real thing ? ” 

“ Bead it and you will know.” 

“ If it isn’t asking too much,” began Tessa, tim- 
idly, “ I wish that you would write me a criticism, 
Gus. I like the way that you talk about books. 
Not many know how to read a book, and still fewer 
know how to talk about it. Will you, please ? ” 

“You overrate my judgment; s'entiment is not in 
my line ; I have done my share in reading books ; I 


240 TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 


do not know that I have got much out of them all. 
My own literary efforts would be like this: 

“ ‘ Here lies — and more’s the pity ! 

All that remains of Thomas New-city.’ 

His name was Newtown.” 

Dinah gave her little shout. 

“ Then you will not promise,” said Tessa, disap- 
pointedly. “I’m not afraid of sharp criticism; I 
want to do my poor little best ; I do not expect to 
do as much as the girls in books who write stories. 
I do not expect any publisher to fall in love with 
me as he did in 8t Elmo., wasn’t it ? ” 

“ What do you expect to do? ” 

“I hope — perhaps that is the better word — to give 
others all the good that is given me; I believe that 
if one has the ‘ gift of utterance ’ even in so small a 
fashion as I have it, that experiences will be given 
to utter; the Divine Biographer writes the life for 
the human heart to read, interpret and put into 
words ! And to them is given a peculiar life, or, it 
may be, a peculiar appreciation of life ; heartaches 
go hand in hand with headaches. 

“ I was born into my home that I may write my 
books ; my poor little books, my little, weak, crook- 
ed-backed children! Would Fredrika Bremer have 
written her books without her exceptional home- 
training, or Sara Coleridge, or any other of the 
lesser lights shine as they do shine, if the spark 
had not been blown upon by the breath of their 
home-fires? When I am sorry sometimes that I 


SEPTEMBER. 


241 


can not do what I would and go where I would, I 
think that I have not gathered together all the 
fragments that are around loose between the plank 
walk and the soldiers’ monument ! Said mother, 
‘ How do you make a book ? Do you take a little 
from this book and a little from that ? ’ ” 

“What did you say ? ” asked Dine. 

“ Oh, I said that I took a tone from her voice, an 
expression from father’s eyes, a curl from your head, 
a word from Gus’s lips, a laugh from Sue Greyson, 
a sigh from Dr. Lake, an apple blossom from Mr. 
Bird’s orchard, a spray of golden rod from the way- 
side, a chat from loungers in the Park, a wise say- 
ing from Miss Jewett — ” 

“ That’s rather a conglomeration,” said Dinah. 
“That is life, as I see it and live it.” 

“What do you take from yourself?” asked Mr. 
Hammerton. 

“ I have all my life from the time that I cried 
over my first lie and prayed that I might have 
curly hair, to the present moment, when I am 
glad and sorry about a thousand things.” 

“ What did mother say ? ” 

“ She said that any one could write a book, then.” 
“ Let her try, then ! It’s awful hard about the 
grammar and spelling and the beginning a chapter 
and ending it and introducing people ! ” 

“ Yes, it’s awful hard or awful easy,” replied Mr. 
Hammerton. “ Which is it. Lady Blue ? ” 

“ Ask me when I have written my novel ! Did 
you hear from the afternoon mail. Dine ? ” 

16 


242 TESSA WADSWORTH^S DISCIPLINE. 


“ Yes,” said Dine, grimly, “ I should think I did 
hear. Mother and I have had a fight ! Father 
took care of the wounded and we are all convales- 
cing. Aunt Theresa has written for one of us to 
come next week ; kindly says that she will take me 
if mother can not spare you ; I said right up and 
down that I wouldn’t go, and mother said right 
down and up that I should go, that she couldn’t and 
wouldn’t spare you! Aunt Theresa has the rheu- 
matism, and it’s horrid dull on a farm I I was there 
when I was a little girl, and she sent me to bed be- 
fore dark ; I’m afraid that she will do it again ; if 
she does I’ll frighten her out of her rheumatics. 
Mother will not let you have a voice in the mat- 
ter, Tessa; who knows but you might meet your 
fate ? The school-teacher boards with them ; he is 
■just out of college. Mother sha’n’t make me go 1 ” 

“ I do not choose to go; but I could have all my 
time to myself A low, cosy chamber and a fire 
on the hearth, no one to intrude or hinder.” 

“But the school-master I ” added Mr. Hammerton. 

“He’s only a boy; I could put him into my book.” 

“We’ll draw lots; shall we?” 

“ If mother is determined, the lot is drawn.” 

“And father wants you, I know; he had an at- 
tack of pain before tea. I wish that I was useful 
and couldn’t be spared.” 

“May I not have a vote; I am a naturalized 
member of the family ? ” 

“You would want Tessa, too,” said Dinah. 

“Would I?” he returned, squeezing the gloved 


SEPTEMBER. 


243 


fingers on his arm, whereupon Dinah became con- 
fused and silent. 

Tessa found her books upon the hall table ; her 
father, Mr. Hammerton, and Dinah followed her 
into the hall to watch her face and laugh over 
her exclamations. 

“Your secret is out,” cried her father; “ at Christ- 
mas there will be a placard in Kunyon’s with the 
name of the book and author in flaming red let- 
ters ! You can not remain the Great Unknown.” 

“ I feel so ashamed of trying,” said Tessa, with 
a brown cover, a red cover, and a green cover in 
her hands, “but I had to. I’ll be too humble to 
be ashamed. ‘Humility’s so good when pride’s 
impossible.’ ” 

Several copies were taken up-stairs; Miss Jew- 
ett’s name was written in one, Mrs. Towne’s in • 
another, Mr. Hammerton’s in one that he had se- 
lected, and in one, bound in a sober gray, she 
wrote, 

“Felix Harrison. In memory of the old school 
days when he helped me with my compositions. 

“T. L. W.” 

She never knew of his sudden, sharp cry over it : 

“ Oh, my life ! my lost life ! my wasted life ! ” 


XVI. 


A TANGLE. 

Mrs. Wadsworth’s strong will triumphed, as it 
usually did, and Dinah was sent into the country 
early in the last week of September, with a prom- 
ise from Tessa that she would release her from her 
durance as soon as one of her books was finished 
and herself spend the remainder of the winter with 
the childless old people who had been looking for- 
ward to this pleasure from winter to winter ever 
since Tessa was ten years old. Half Dunellen had 
pacified Dinah with the promise of long weekly 
letters, and she knew that Tessa and her father 
would write often. “ I am not strong enough to 
write letters,” her mother had said. “Tessa will 
tell you every thing.” “I will add a postscript 
whenever Tessa will permit,” said Mr. Hammer- 
ton, which queerly enough consoled homesick Di- 
nah more than all the other promises combined. 

Sue had not come to talk to Tessa and she dared 
not go to Dr. Greyson’s for fear of infiuencing her. 
She had met Dr. Lake once; he had lifted his hat 
with a flourish, but would not stop to speak to her. 

And now it was Wednesday and Sue’s wedding 
day had been set for Friday. 


A TANGLE. 


245 


At noon, among other letters, her father brought 
her a note from Felix Harrison : 

“ I must see you; I want to talk to you. Come 
Wednesday afternoon.” 

How she shrank from this interview she did not 
understand until she could think it over years after- 
ward. In those after years when she said, “ I do 
not want to live my life over again,” she remem- 
bered her experiences with Felix Harrison; more 
than all, the feeling of those weeks when she had 
felt hound. It was also in her mind when she said, 
as she often did say, in later life, “ I could never in- 
fluence any one to marry.” How often an expres- 
sion in the mature years of a woman’s life would 
reveal a long story, if one could but read it. 

Another word of hers in her middle age, “ I love 
to help little girls to be happy,” was the expression 
to years of longing that no one had ever guessed; 
her mother least of all. 

But she had not come to this settled time yet; it 
was weary years before she was at leisure from her- 
self It was Wednesday noon now and Felix had 
sent for her; she shrank from him with a shrink- 
ing amounting to terror; he would touch her hand, 
most certainly, and he might put his arm around 
her and kiss her; she would faint and fall at his 
feet if he did; he might say that she had promised 
him, that she was bound to him, that he would 
never let her go ; that he was gaining strength and 
that she must become his wife or he would die 1 

Why could he not write his message? What 


246 T£SSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 


could he have to say to her? Was it not all said 
and laid away to be remembered, perhaps, and that 
was all? Then the memory of the old Felix swept 
over her, and she bowed her head and wept for him ! 
She had held herself in her heart as his promised 
wife for six long weeks, how could she shrink from 
him? Was he not to her what no other man would 
ever become? Was she not to him the one best 
and dearest ? 

“ I wonder,” she sobbed, “ why Tie had to be the 
one to love me ; why was not the love given to one 
whom I could love? Why must such a good and 
perfect gift as love be a burden to him and to me ? 
If some one I know — ” 

The cheeks that were wet for Felix Harrison 
burned at the thought of one she knew ! 

“ Oh, I wonder — but I must not wonder — I must 
be submissive ; I must bow before the Awful Will.” 

In that hour it was harder to bear for Felix 
Harrison to love her than for Kalph Towne to be 
indifferent. 

“What are you going to do this afternoon?” 
inquired her mother at the dinner table. 

“Take my walk! And then the thing that comes 
first.” 

“You never have any plan about any thing; any 
one with so little to do ought to have a plan.” 

“ My plan is this — do the next thing! I find that 
it keeps me busy.” 

“ The next thing, hard or easy,” said Mr. Wads- 
worth. 


A TANGLE. 


247 


“Hard! Easy!” repeated Mrs. W'adsworth in 
her ironical voice. “ Tessa never had a hard thing 
to do in her life. It will be my comfort in my last 
hours, Tessa, that you have been kept from troubles 
and disappointments.” 

“You might as well take the comfort of it now,” 
said Tessa. 

“Not many young women of your age have 
your easy life,” her mother continued; “you have 
no thought where your next meal will come from, 
or where you will live in your old age, or where — ” 

“ I know where all my good things come from,” 
interrupted Tessa, reverently; “the how, the when, 
and the what that I do not know — that I am wait- 
ing to know.” 

“That is like you! Not a thought, not a care; 
it will come dreadful hard to you if you ever do 
have trouble.” 

Tessa’s tears ever left in her heart a place for 
sweet laughter; so light, so soft, so submissive, and 
withal so happy was the low laugh of her reply 
that her father’s eyes filled at the sound. Some- 
body understood her. 

Mrs. Wadsworth looked annoyed. Her elder 
daughter’s words bafled her. Tessa tvas shallow 
and she sighed and asked her if she would take 
apple pie. 

Tessa ate her pie understanding how she was a 
trial to her mother, but not understanding how she 
could hinder it. Could she change herself? or 
could her mother change herself? 


248 TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 

“ I wish that it were easier for me to love peo- 
ple,” she said coming out of a reverie, “then I 
would not need to trouble myself about not un- 
derstanding them.” 

“I thought that you were a student of human 
nature,” said her father. 

“I always knew that she couldn’t see through 
people,” exclaimed her mother. 

“I do not; I never know when I am deceived.” 

“My rule is,” Mr. Wadsworth arose and stood be- 
hind his chair, “to judge people by themselves and 
not by myself'' 

“Oh, the heartaches that would save,” thought 
Tessa. At the hour when she was walking slowly 
towards Felix, her black dress brushing the grass, 
her eyes upon the harvested fields lying warm in 
the mellow sunlight, and on her lips the sorrowful 
wonder, he was sitting alone in the summer-house, 
his head dropped within his hands. He was won- 
dering, too, as all his being leaped forward at the 
thought of her coming, and battling with the strong 
love that was too strong for his feeble strength. 

When her hand unlatched the gate, he was not 
in the summer-house ; she walked up the long path, 
and around to the latticed porch where Laura liked 
to sew or read in the afternoons ; there was no one 
there; the work-basket had been pushed over, cot- 
ton and thimble had rolled to the edge of the floor, 
the white work had been thrown over a chair; 
she stood a moment in the oppressive silence, 
trembling and half leaning against a post ; the tall 


A TANGLE. 


249 


clock in the hall ticked loudly and evenly: forever 
• — never, never — forever! Her heart quickened, 
every thing grew dark like that night in the lec- 
ture-room, she was possessed with a terror that 
swept away breath and motion. A groan, then 
another and another, interrupted the never — for- 
ever, of the clock, then a step on the oil-cloth of 
the hall, and she dimly discerned Laura’s frightened 
face, and heard as if afar off her surprised voice : 
“Why, Tessa! 0, Tessa, I am so glad! ” 

The frightened face was held up to be kissed and 
arms were clinging around her. 

“I’m always just as frightened every time — he 
was in the summer-house and father found him — 
he can speak now — it doesn’t last very long.” 

“I will not stay, he needs you.” 

“Not now, no one can help him; father is with 
him. If this keeps on Dr. Greyson says that some 
day he will have to be undressed and dressed just 
like an infant. He has been nervous all day, as if 
he were watching for something. 0, Tessa, I want 
to die, I want him to die, I can’t bear it any longer.” 

Tessa’s only reply was her fast dropping tears. 

“If he only had a mother,” said Laura; “I want 
him to have a mother now that he can never have 
a wife! If he only had been married, his wife 
would have clung to him, and loved him, and 
taken care of him. Don’t you think that God 
might have waited to bring this upon him until 
he was married? ” 

“Oh, no, no, wo/” shivered Tessa; “we do not 


250 TESSA WADSWORTH^ S DISCIPLINE. 


know the best times for trouble to come. I shall 
always believe that after this.” 

“He always liked you better than any one; do 
you know that he has a picture of you taken when 
we went to the Institute ? Yoii have on a hat and 
sacque, and your school books are in your hand.” 

“I remember that picture! Has he kept it all 
this time ? ” 

“ If he asks for you — he will hear your voice — 
will you go in ? ” 

“No, I can not see him,” she answered nervously. 

“Then I will walk down to the gate with you. 
He will be sure to ask, and I do not like to refuse 
him.” 

Walking slowly arm in arm as they used to walk 
from school years ago, they passed down the path, 
at first, speaking only of Felix, and then as they 
neared the gate, falling into light talk about Laura’s 
work, the new servant who was so kind to Felix, 
the plants that Laura had taken into the sitting- 
room, “ to make it cosy for Felix this winter,” the 
shirts that she had cut out for him and their father, 
and intended to make on the machine; about the 
sewing society that was to meet to-morrow, a book 
that Felix was reading aloud evenings while their 
father dozed and she sewed, some Mayfield gossip 
about Dr. Towne, and their plan of taking Felix 
travelling next summer. Tessa listened and re- 
plied. She never had any thing to say about her- 
self Laura thought with Mrs. Wadsworth that 
Tessa had never had any “experiences.” Miss Jew- 


A TANGLE. 


251 


ett and Tessa’s father knew ; but it was not because 
she had told them. What other people chattered 
about to each other she kept for her prayers. 

Laura cried a little when Tessa kissed her at the‘ 
gate. “ I wish that you wouldn’t go ; I want you to 
stay and help me. Will you come again soon ? ” 

“ I can’t,” she answered hurriedly. 

“Did Felix know that you were coming to-day?” 

Tessa’s eyes made answer enough ; too much, for 
Laura understood. 

“I will not tell him that I knoAV — but I had 
guessed it — I heard him praying once while we 
were away, and I knew that he was giving up you'^ 

Tessa kissed her again, and without a word hur- 
ried away, walking with slower steps as she went 
on with her full eyes bent upon the ground. 

Was it so much to give up Tessa Wadsworth ? 
What was she that she could make such a differ- 
ence in a man’s life ? Was she lovable, after all, 
despite her quick words and sharp speeches ?. She 
was not pretty like Dinah, or “taking” like Sue; 
it was very pleasant to be loved for her own sake ; 
“my own unattractive self,” she said. It would be 
very pleasant in that far-off time, when she re- 
viewed her life, to remember that some one had 
loved her beside her father and Dine and Miss 
Jewett! And a good man, too; a man with brains, 
and a pure heart I 

Her ideal was a man with brains, and a pure 
heart; then why had she not loved Felix Harrison? 

“ Oh, I don’t know,” she sighed. “ I can’t under- 


252 TESSA WADSWORTW S DISCIPLINE. 


stand.” Slowly, slowly, with her full eyes on the 
ground she went on, not heeding the sound of 
wheels, or gay voices, as a carriage passed her now 
and then ; but as she went on, with her eyes still 
full for Felix, a light sound of wheels set her heart 
to beating, and she lifted her eyes to bow to Dr. 
Towne. 

In that instant her heart bowed before the Awful 
Will in acceptance of the love that had been given 
to her, even as other things in her lot had been 
given her, without any seeking or asking. 

“ I can bear it,” she felt, filling the words with 
Paul’s thought, when he wrote, “I can do all 
things.” 

Dr. Towne drew the reins : she stood still on the 
edge of the foot-path. 

“My mother misses you. Miss Tessa.” 

“Does she? I am sorry, but I have to be so 
busy at home.” 

His sympathetic eyes were on her face. “I 
thought that you were never troubled about any 
thing,” he said. 

“ I am not — when I can help it.” 

“ I left Sue Greyson up the road looking for you; 
I could not bring her to meet you, as my carriage 
holds but one ; there was news in her face.” 

“ Then I will go to hear.” 

The light sound of his wheels had died away 
before she espied Sue’s tall figure coming quickly 
towards her. 

“Oh, Tessa! How covUd you go so far? Your 


A TANGLE. 


253 


mother said that you were here on this road, and 
that I should find you either up a tree or in the 
brook ; I’ve got splendid news ! guess 1 Did you 
meet Dr. Towne ? He stopped and talked to me, 
but I wouldn’t tell him. He and his mother will 
know in time. Now, guess.” 

“ Let me sit down and think. It will take time.” 

They had met near the brook at the corner of the 
road that turned past Old Place; on the comer 
stood a tall, bare walnut-tree, the gnarled roots 
covered a part of the knoll under which a slim 
thread of water trickled over moss and jagged flat 
stones, and then found its clear way into a broader 
channel and thence into the brook that crossed one 
of the Old Place meadows. 

These roots had been Tessa’s resting-place all 
summer; how many times she had looked up to 
read the advertisement of the clothier in Dunellen 
painted in black letters on a square board nailed to 
the trunk; how many times had she leaned back 
and looked down into the thread of water at the 
moss, and the pebbles, the tiny ferns and the tall 
weeds, turning to look down the road towards May- 
field where the school-house stood, and then across 
the fields — the wheat fields, the corn fields — to the 
peach orchard beyond them, and beyond that the 
green slope of the fertile hill-side with its few 
dwellings, and above the slope the crooked green 
edge that met the sky — sometimes a blue sky, some- 
times a sky of clouds, and sometimes gray with the 
damp clouds hanging low; thinking, as her eyes 


254 TESSA WADSWORTH'S DISCIPLINE. 

roved off her book, of some prank of Rob’s or some 
quaint saying of Sadie’s, of some little comforting 
thought that swelled in grandma’s patient, gentle 
heart, or of something sharp that Sadie’s snappish 
mother should say; sometimes she would take the 
sky home for her book and sometimes the weeds 
and the pebbles and the brook; and when it was 
not her book it was Felix — poor Felix! — or Dr. 
Lake, whom she loved more and more every day 
with the love that she would have loved a naughty, 
feeble, winsome child; or Mr. Towne, of his face 
that was ever with her like the memor}^ of a pic- 
ture that she had lingered before and could never 
forget, or of his voice and some words that he had 
spoken; or of her father and his failing strength 
and brave efforts to conceal it; sometimes a kind 
little thing that her mother had done for her, some 
self-denial or shame-faced demonstration of her love 
for her elder daughter, sometimes of Dine’s change- 
ful moods, and often of the book of George Eliot’s 
that she was reading, or the latest of Charles Kings- 
ley’s that she was discussing with Mr. Hammer- 
ton ; thinking, musing, feeling, planning while she 
picked up a pebble or tore a weed into bits, or 
wrote a sentence in her pocket note-book I It was 
no wonder that this gnarled seat was so much to 
her that she lost herself and lost the words that 
Sue was speaking so rapidly. 

“You are not listening to me at all,” cried Sue 
at last. “ I might as well talk to the tree as to talk 
to you 1 ” 


A TANGLE. 


266 


“ I am listening; what is it ? ” 

“ It’s all settled — splendidly settled — and I’m as 
happy as Cinderella when she found the Prince ! 
Now guess ! ” 

“Well, then,” stooping to pick a weed that had 
gone to seed, “ I guess that you have come to your 
right mind, that you will marry Stacey on Fri- 
day and all will go as merry as a marriage bell 
should.” 

“What a thing to guess! That’s too horrid! 
Guess again.” 

“You have grown good and ‘steady,’ you will 
keep house for your father and be what he is al- 
ways calling you, — ^^the comfort of his old age, — 
and forego lovers and such perplexities forever.” 

“ That’s horrider still ! Do guess something sen- 
sible.” 

“You are going to marry Dr. Lake. Your fa- 
ther has stormed and stormed, but now he has be- 
come mild and peaceable; you are to be married 
Friday morning and start off immediately in the 
sober certainty of waking bliss.” 

“Yes,” said Sue very seriously, “that is it. 
Every thing is as grand as a story-book, except 
that father will not give me the house for a wed- 
ding present. Oh, those wretched days since I 
saw you last ! I did think that I would take laud- 
anum or kill myself with a penknife. You don’t 
know what I have been through. Old Blue Beard 
is pious to what father has been ; Gerald, he kept 
out of the house. I should have run away before 


256 TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 


this, only I knew that father would come around 
and beg my pardon. He always does.” 

Tessa stooped to dip her fingers in the water. 

“And this is your idea of marriage,” she said 
quietly. 

“No, it isn’t. I never looked forward to any 
thing like this; I always wanted something bet- 
ter. I am not doing very well, although I sup- 
pose there are girls in Dunellen who would think 
Gerald a catch.” 

“Oh, Sue, Sue! when he loves you so! If he 
could hear you, it would break his heart ! ” 

“Take him yourself then, if you think he’s so 
much,” laughed Sue. “Nan Gerard will get the 
catch ! ” 

“ Sue, I am ashamed of you ! ” exclaimed Tessa 
rising. “ I am glad if you are happy — as happy as 
you know how to be. I want you to be happy — 
and do be good to Dr. Lake.” 

How Sue laughed ! 

“Oh, you dear old Goody Goody,” she cried, 
springing to her feet and throwing her arms 
around Tessa. “What else should I be to my 
own wedded husband? But it does seem queer 
so near to Old Place to be talking about marrying 
Dr. Lake.” 

“We’ll remember this place always. Sue, and 
that you promised to be kind to Dr. Lake.” 

“Yes, ni remember,” with a shadow passing 
over her face. “The next time you and I sit here 
it will be all over with me. I shall be out of lovers 


A TANGLE. 


257 


for the rest of my natural life.” She laughed and 
chatted all the way home; her listener was silent 
and sore at heart. 

“You will come to-morrow night and see the last 
of me, won’t you? This is what I came to ask 
you, ‘ the last sad office ’ isn’t that it ? Sue Grey- 
son will never ask you another favor.” 

“Yes, I will come.” She had always loved Sue 
Greyson. She did not often kiss her, but she kissed 
her now. 

“Don’t look so. Laugh, can’t you? If it is 
something terrible, it isn’t happening to you.” 

“ The things that happen to me are the easiest 
to bear.” 

Sue crossed over to the planks and went on pon- 
dering this, then gave it up to wonder how she 
would wear her hair on her wedding morning; 
Tessa would make it look pretty any way, for she 
was born a hair-dresser. 

And Tessa went in and up-stairs, thinking of a 
remark of Miss Jewett’s: “I should not understand 
my life at all, it would be all in a tangle, if it were 
not for my prayers.” 


XVIL 

THE NIGHT BEFORE. 

Two of the pretty crimson and brown chairs 
were drawn to the back parlor grate; Sue had 
kindled a fire in the back parlor because she felt 
“ shivery,” beside, it had rained all day ; the wed- 
ding morning promised to be chilly and rainy. 

Early after tea Dr. Greyson had been called 
away; Dr. Lake had not returned from a long 
drive, the latest Irish girl was singing lustily in 
the kitchen; Sue and Tessa were alone together 
before the fire. The white shades were down, the 
doors between the rooms closed, they were alto- 
gether cozy and comfortable. Almost as comforta- 
ble, Tessa was thinking, as if there were no dread- 
ed to-morrow; but then she was the only person 
in the world who could see any thing to be dread- 
ed in the to-morrow. Tessa’s fingers were moving 
in and out among the white wool that she was cro- 
cheting into a long comforter for her father; Sue 
sat idly restless looking into Tessa’s face or into 
the fire. 

Now and then Tessa spoke, now and then Sue 
ejaculated or laughed or sighed. 


THE NIGHT BEFORE. 


259 


“Life is too queer for any thing,” she said re- 
flectively. “Don’t you know the minister said 
that Sunday that we helped to make our own 
lives ? I have often thought of that.” 

Tessa’s wool was tangled, she unknotted it with- 
out replying. 

The rain plashed against the windows, a coal fell 
through the grate and dropped upon the fender. 

“I wonder how Stacey feels,” said Sue. “Per- 
haps he is taking out another girl to-night. That 
ring was large, it will not fit a small hand ; per- 
haps he sold it, you can always get three quar- 
ters the worth of a diamond, I have heard people 
say.” 

Tessa’s lips were not encouraging, but Sue was 
not looking at her. 

“Gerald has the wedding ring in his pocket; I 
tried it on this noon. I wanted to wear it to get 
used to it, but he wouldn’t let me. He is senti- 
mental like you. I expect that he is really enjoy- 
ing carrying it around in his pocket. S. G. L. is 
written in it.” 

The rain plashed and Tessa worked; suddenly 
the door-bell gave a sharp clang, a moment later 
little Miss Jewett, in a waterproof, was ushered in. 

“ I had to come, girls. I hope I don’t intrude.” 

“ Intrude ! ” Both of Sue’s affectionate arms were 
around the wet figure. “Tessa is thinking of glum 
things to say to me, do sit down and say something 
funny.” 

The long waterproof was unbuttoned and hung 


260 TESSA WADSWORTH'S DISCIPLINE. 


upon the hatstand in the hall, the rubbers were 
placed upon the hearth to dry, and the plump lit- 
tle woman pressed into Tessa’s arm-chair. Moving 
an ottoman to her side, Tessa sat with her arm upon 
the arm of her chair. 

“I’m so glad to see you,” Sue cried, dropping 
into her own chair. “ What a long walk you 
have had in the rain just to give me some good 
advice. Don’t you wish that Tessa was going off, 
too?” 

“Tessa will not go off till she is good and ready,” 
replied Miss Jewett, “and then she will go off to 
some purpose.” 

“ Make a good match, do you mean ? ” 

“ If she can find her match,” caressing the hand 
on the arm of the chair. 

“ Oh, Miss Jewett, tell us a story ! A real love 
story ! Humor me just this once, this last time ! 
I don’t like advice and I do like love stories.” 

“ Do you, too, Tessa ? ” 

“Yes, I shall write one some day! They shall 
both be perfect and love each other perfectly. It 
shall not be an earthly story, but a heavenly 
one.” 

“That would be too tame,” said Sue. “ I should 
want it to be a little wicked.” 

“ That would be more like life — ” 

“ And then get good in the end I That is like 
life, too,” interrupted Sue. “Now, go on, please.” 

“Very well. To-night is an event, I suppose I 
may as well celebrate it. I will tell you about a 


THE NIGHT BEFORE. 


261 


present I had once, the most perfect gift I ever 
received.” 

“ But I wanted a love story.” 

“ And you think that my story can not be that ? 
Sometimes I think that unmarried people live the 
most perfect love stories.” 

Lifting the mass of white wool from Tessa’s lap 
and taking the needle, she worked half a minute 
before she spoke; Sue’s curious, bright eyes were 
on her face, Tessa’s were on the wool she was play- 
ing with. 

“Twenty-five years ago, when I was younger 
than I am now, and as intense and as full of aspi- 
rations as Tessa here, and as full of fun, as you., 
Sue Greyson, I boarded one winter with a widow. 
She was quite middle-aged and lived alone with 
her chickens and cat, very comfortably off, but 
she wanted a boarder or two for company. My 
store was a little affair then, but I was a busy 
body; I used to study and sew evenings. Ah, 
those evenings I I often think them over now as 
I sit alone. I shall never forget that winter. I 
grew. The widow and I were not alone ; before I 
had been there a week a young man came, he was 
scarcely older than 1 — ” 

Sue laughed and looked at Tessa. 

“He was to sail away in the spring to some 
dreadful place, — that sounds like you. Sue, — to be 
a missionary ! ” 

“ A missimiary ! ” exclaimed Sue. 

“Every evening he read aloud to us, usually 


262 TESSA WADSWORTH'S DISCIPLINE. 


poetry or the Bible. Poetry meant something to 
me then — that sounds like you, Tessa. One even- 
ing he read Esther, one evening Ruth, and when 
he read Nehemiah, oh, how enthusiastic we were ! 
He talked and talked and talked, and I listened 
and listened and listened till all my heart went out 
to meet him.” 

“ Ah,” cried Sue, “ to think of you being in love, 
Miss Jewett. I didn’t know that you were ever so 
naughty ! ” 

“At last the time came that he must go — the 
very last evening. I thought that those evenings 
could never end, but they did. I could hardly see 
my stitches for tears; I was making over a black 
bombazine for the widow, and the next evening I 
had to rip my work out ! He read awhile, — he was 
reading Rasselm that night, — and then he dropped 
the book and talked of his work and the life he 
expected to lead. 

‘“You ought to take a wife,’ said the widow. 

“‘No woman will ever love me well enough to 
go to such a place with me,’ he said. 

“Just then I dropped the scissors and had to 
bend down to pick them up. The widow went out 
into the kitchen to set the sponge for her bread and 
clear out the stove for morning, and we stayed alone 
and talked. We talked about whether he would be 
homesick and seasick, and how glad he would be of 
letters from home ; not that he had many friends to 
write to him, though ; and I sewed on and on, and 
threaded my needle, and dropped my scissors, and 


THE NIGHT BEFORE. 


263 


almost cried because all I cared for in the wide 
world would sail away with him, and he would 
never know ! 

‘“The best of friends must part,’ he said when 
she brought in his candle and lighted it for him. 

“In the morning, we all arose early and took our 
last breakfast together by lamplight. She shook 
hands with him twice, and wished him all sorts of 
good wishes, and then he held out his hand to me 
and said, ‘Good-by.’ I said, ‘Good-by.’ And then 
he said, ‘You have given me a very pleasant win- 
ter; I shall often think of it.’ And I said, ‘Thank 
you,’ and ran away up-stairs to cry by myself. 
That was five and twenty years ago — before you 
were born. Sue, and before Tessa could creep ; there 
were wet eyes in the world, before you were born, 
girls, and there will be wet eyes long after we are 
all dead ; and always for the same reason — because 
somebody loves somebody. 

“ He is a hard worker — I rejoice in his life. !Five 
years ago he came home, but not to Dunellen ; he 
had no friends here; after resting awhile he re- 
turned to his field of labor, and died before he 
reached it, but was buried in the place he loved 
better than home. 

“I thought of him and loved him and prayed 
for him through those twenty years. I think of 
him and love him and give thanks for him now, 
and shall till I die and afterwards ! ” 

“Why didn’t you go with him ? ” asked Sue. 

“ He did not ask me.” 


264 TESSA WADSWORTH'S DISCIPLINE. 


“ Would you if he had ? ” 

“ I certainly should.” 

“ Couldn’t you bring him to the point ? It would 
have been easy enough.” 

“ The gentleman did the asking in those days,” 

Sue laughed. “ And wasn’t he ever married ? ” 

“No.” 

“ What a pity ! I thought that every thing al- 
ways went right for people like you and Tessa. 
But I don’t see where the perfect gift comes in, do 
you, Tessa?” 

“Yes, but I’m afraid that I don’t want such a 
perfect gift. I couldn’t bear it — twenty years.” 

“ Tell me — I can’t guess. Did he give you some- 
thing?” 

“No, he did not.” 

“ Didn’t he love you?" 

“ No, he did not love me.” 

“ Where is the gift then ? ” 

“ My love for him was my perfect gift. It was 
given by One in whom there is no shadow of 
turning.” 

“ I am not strong enough to receive such a gift,” 
said Tessa looking troubled. 

“ Oh, dear me, I hope not. Oh, dear me, horrid ! 
What a story to tell the night before my wedding ! 
All I care about is about being loved! I didn’t 
know that the loving made any difference or did 
any good! That story is too sorrowful. Gerald 
would like that.” 

The long ivory needle moved in and out; the 


THE NIGHT BEFORE. 


265 


fair face, half a century old, was full of loveli- 
ness. 

“ That is for you to remember all your life. Sue.” 

“ I sha’n’t. I shall forget it. I only remember 
pleasant things.” 

“ I wonder if Fredrika Bremer were as happy as 
you. Miss Jewett. She says that a gentleman in- 
spired her with a ‘ pure and warm feeling,’ that it 
was never responded to, and yet it had a powerful 
influence upon her development.” 

“ Was she reoZ ? ” inquired Sue. “ I thought that 
she only wrote books.” 

“It takes very real people to write,” answered 
Tessa. “ The more real you are, the more you are 
called to write.” 

Slipping off the low chair, down to the rug. Sue 
laid her head in Miss Jewett’s lap, the white wool 
half concealing the braids and curls and frizzes; 
the thin, excited face was turned toward the ffre, 
the brown eyes, wild and yet timid, were misty 
with tears. 

Miss Jewett and Tessa Wadsworth were the only 
people in the world who had ever seen this phase 
of Sue Greyson. 

Dr. Lake had never seen her subdued or fright- 
ened. At this instant she was both. There were 
some things that Sue could feel ; there were not any 
that she could understand. 

“ Sometimes,” said Sue, in a hollow whisper, “ I’m 
so afraid, I want to run away ; I was afraid I might 
run away and so I asked Tessa to come to-night.” 


266 TESSA WADSWORTH^ S DISCIPLINE. 


“My dear!” Miss Jewett’s warm lips touched 
her forehead. 

“ Oh, it isn’t any thing I I like Gerald ; I adore 
him. I wouldn’t marry him if I didn’t I I am 
always afraid of a leap into the dark, and I am 
always jumping into dark places.” 

“ It is a leap for Aim, too. Sue; you seem to forget 
that,” suggested Tessa. 

“You always think of him, you never think of 
me.” 

“It is a pity for no one to think of him; if I 
were to be married to-morrow, I should cry all 
night, out of pity for the hapless bridegroom.” 

“Tessa, you ridiculous child,” exclaimed Miss 
Jewett. 

“In books,” Sue went on, still with her face 
turned from them, “ girls choose the one they are 
to marry out of all the world. Why don’t we ? ” 

“We do,” said Tessa. 

“We don’t. We take somebody because he asks 
us and nobody else asks.” 

“ I will not. I do not believe that God means it 
so. He chooses that we shall satisfy the best and 
hungriest part of ourselves, and the best part is the 
hungriest, and the hungriest the best ; we may not 
have opportunity in one year, or two years, or ten 
years, but if we wait He will give us the things 
we most need I He did not give us any longing 
simply to make us go crying through the universe ; 
the longing is His message making known to us 
that the good thing is. I will not be false to my- 


THE. NIGHT BEFORE. 


267 


self, cheating myself by shutting my eyes and say- 
ing, ‘ Ah, this is good ! I have found my choice,’ 
when my whole soul protests, knowing that it is 
a lie. I can wait.” 

“ Oh, Tessa ! ” -laughed Sue. “ Doesn’t she talk 
like a book ? I never half know what she means 
when she goes into such hysterics. Do you expect 
to get all your good things ? ” 

“All my good things! Yes, every single one; it 
is only a question of time. God can not forget, 
nor can He die. I shall not be discouraged until 
I am sure that He is dead.” 

“ 0, Tessa, you are wicked,” cried Sue. 

“You remind me of something,” said Miss Jew- 
ett. “ ‘ Blessed are all they that wait for Him.' " 

“I can’t wait for my blessings,” said Sue; “I 
want to snatch them.” 

Gently pushing aside Sue’s head, Tessa found her 
work and her needle; she worked silently while 
Sue laughed and grumbled and Miss Jewett talked, 
not over Sue’s head as Tessa’s habit was, but into 
her heart. 

“ Sue, I shall lose you in Bible-class.” 

“ I never answered any questions or studied any 
lesson, you will not care for my empty place. Ger- 
ald is getting awfully good ; he reads the Bible and 
Prayer-book every night; every morning when I 
go in to fix up his room, I find them on a little 
table by his bed ; I suppose he reads in bed nights. 
He used to be bad and talk dreadful things when 
he first came ; did you ever hear him, Tessa ? ” 


268 TESSA WADSWORTH^S DISCIPLINE. 

“Yes.” 

“ But he’s awful good now ; he thinks that people 
ought to go to church, and say their prayers ; I hope 
he will keep it up ; I will not hinder him. I want 
to be good, too.” 

Tessa’s needle moved in and out; she did not 
hear Sue’s voice, or see the kneeling, green figure ; 
her eyes were looking upon the face she had looked 
down into that evening in January, such a little 
time since ; and she was hearing her voice as she 
heard it in the night. Had she forgotten so soon ? 
Or was it the remembrance that gave her the un- 
rest to-night ? Was she conscious without under- 
standing ? And had her Ralph Towne done this ? 
After having withdrawn himself from Sue, was he 
keeping her from seeing the good and the hap- 
piness of marriage with Dr. Lake ? Would the 
thought of him come between her and the content- 
ment that she might have had ? 

But no, she was putting herself into Sue’s posi- 
tion ; that would not do ; it was Sue’s self and not 
her own self that she must analyze ! If.she could 
tell Ralph Towne her fears to-night, his eyes would 
grow dark and grave, and then he would toss the 
feeling away with his amused laugh and say, “ Sue 
is not deep enough for that ! She did not care for 
me. Why must you think a romance about her ? ” 

Was she not deep enough for that? Who could 
tell that ? 

She listened to Sue’s lively talk and tried to be- 
lieve that his reply would be just; the one most 


THE NIGHT BEFORE. 


269 


bitter thought of all was, that if she were suffering 
it was through his selfishness or stupidity. Why 
must he be so stupid about such things ? Had he 
no heart himself? 

Sue was laughing again. “ Oh, dear ! I must be 
happy; if I am not I shall be unhappy ! It would 
kill me to be unhappy ! I never think of unpleas- 
ant things five minutes.” 

The sound of wheels near the windows, and a 
call to “Jerry” in a loud, quick voice, brought them 
all to a startling sense of the present. 

“There he is,” cried Sue, springing lightly to her 
feet. 

Tessa was relieved that she said “ he ” instead of 
“Gerald” or “Dr. Lake.” 

“If you will not stay all night, too. Miss Jewett, 
he shall take you home.” 

“ I can not, dear. I only came because I wanted 
to talk with Sue Greyson once more before f lost 
her.” 

Eubbers and waterproof were hurried on, and 
Tessa was left alone with the fire, the rain, and 
her work. 

Suppose that it were herself who was to be mar- 
ried to-morrow — 

Would she wish to run away? Kun away from 
whom ? Although her Ealph Towne had died and 
been buried, that old, sharp, sweet, memory was 
wrapped around her still; it would always be sweet 
although so sharp — and bitterly, bitterly sharp al- 
though so sweet ; if it might become wholly the one 


270 TESSA WADSWORTH^ S DISCIPLINE. 


or wholly the other, but it could never be that ; nev- 
er unless she learned Love’s lesson as Mrs. Towne 
had laid it before her. But that was so utterly and 
hopelessly beyond her present growth ! 

Would he despise her if he could know how much 
that happy time was in her thoughts? Was she 
tenacious where stronger minds would forget ? He 
would think her weak and romantic like the heroine 
of a story paper novel; that is, if he could think 
weak any thing so wholly innocent. 

She trusted the emerald ring on her finger; at 
times it burned into her flesh ; sometimes she tore 
it off that she might forget her promise, and then — 
oh, foolish, incomprehensible, womanly Tessa ! — she 
would take it again and slip it on with a reverence 
and love for the old memory that she could not be 
ashamed of although she tried. 

Had she been too hard upon Kalph Towne in 
their latest interview ? Why need ^he have given 
shape to her hitherto unspoken thoughts concern- 
ing his life ; she could not tell him of her prayers 
that he might change and yet become — for it was 
not too late — the good, good man that she had 
once believed him to be. He had taken away her 
faith in himself; he might give it back, grown 
stronger, if he would. If he only would ! 

Dr. Greyson’s step was in the hall; Sue’s voice 
was less excited, her father was speaking quietly to 
her. Sue, poor Sue! She would never be again 
the free, wild Sue Greyson that she was to-night. 

Tessa felt Dr. Lake’s mood ; she could have writ- 


THE NIGHT BEFORE. 


271 


ten out his thoughts, as he drove homeward in the 
rain; she dreaded his hilarious entrance, how his 
eyes would shine, with tears close behind them ! 

Her reverie was interrupted by the entrance that 
she dreaded. “ Ah, Mystic, praying for my happi- 
ness here alone ! I know you are. I come to be 
congratulated.” 

“ I congratulate you,” she said rising and taking 
his hand. Not so very long afterward, when she saw 
his cold, dead hands folded together and touched 
them, she remembered with starting tears this soft, 
hot, clinging clasp. 

“You didn’t dream of this two months ago, did 
you ? ” he cried, dropping into the chair that Sue 
had been sitting in. “You didn’t know that I was 
born under a lucky star despite ail my woeful past. 
I have turned over a new leaf; I turned it over to- 
night in the rain ; it is chapter first. Such a white 
page. Mystic. Don’t you want to write something 
on it for me ? ” 

“I wouldn’t dare.” 

“Oh, yes, you would! What do you wish for 
me ? Write that.” 

“ I wish for you — ” she rolled the white wool over 
her hand. 

“ Well, go on I Something that must come true ! ” 

“ — The love that suffers long and is Idnd'' 

“ Whew ! ” He drew a long breath. “ There is 
no place for that in me.” 

Sue entered noisily. She did every thing noisily. 

“Come here, Susan.” Dr. Lake caught her in 


272 TESSA WADSWORTH^ S DISCIPLINE. 

his arms, but she slipped through them, moving to 
Tessa’s side, seating herself upon the rug, and rest- 
ing both hands in Tessa’s lap. 

“I was reading the other day” — he stooped to 
smooth Sue’s flounce — “ of a fellow who fell dead 
upon his wedding day, as soon as the knot was 
tied. Perhaps it was tied too tight and choked him. 
Suppose I drop dead, Susan, will you like to be a 
bewitching young widow so soon ? Whom would 
you And to flirt with before night ? ” 

“ Gerald, you are wicked ! ” 

“ Probably this bridegroom had heart disease. I 
haven’t heart disease, except for you, my Shrine, 
my Heart’s Desire.” 

“ Isn’t he wretched, Tessa ? He tells me all kinds 
of stories about people dying of joy ! ” 

He bent forward, drawing her towards him back- 
ward, and with both arms around her, kissed the 
top of her head and her forehead. 

“You mustn’t do so before folks,” said Sue shak- 
ing herself free. 

“ Mystic isn’t folks ! She is my guardian angel.” 

“I know that you would rather have married 
her.” 

“ But she wouldn’t rather have married me, would 
you, Mystic?” 

“ I can’t imagine it,” returned Tessa, as seriously 
as he had spoken. “ Set your jealous heart at rest. 
Sue.” 

“ I never thought of it, but once in my life,” he 
continued, musingly, “and that was when I was 


THE NIGHT BEFORE. 


273 


down in the deeps about you, Susan; I did think 
that she might drag me out — a drowning man, you 
know, will catch at a straw. It was one night, 
when she was weeding her pansies and refused to 
ride with me. I’m glad that you never did re- 
fuse me. Mystic, you couldn’t be setting there so 
composedly.” 

“Oh, yes, I would; I should have known that 
you were insane.” 

“ I was insane — all one week.” 

“ I believe that,” said Sue. 

“ I wonder what we shall all be thinking about 
the next time that we three sit here together ! It 
will be too late for us to go back then, Susan ; the 
die will be cast, the Kubicon crossed, another poor 
man undone forever. Are you regretting it, child ? ” 
drawing her again towards him backward and gaz- 
ing down into her face. “ Shall we quit at this last 
last minute? Speak the word! You never- shall 
throw it up at me, that I urged you into it. It will 
be a mess for us if we do hate each other after 
awhile.” 

“ I will never hate you, Gerald.” 

“ But I might hate you, though, who knows ? ” 
smoothing her hair with his graceful, weak hands. 

“Then Tessa shall be peacemaker,” said Sue 
straightening herself. 

“No; I will not,” replied Tessa, gathering her 
work and rising. “Sue, you will find me up- 
stairs.” 

“Then I’m coming, too; I don’t want to stay and 
18 


274 TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 


be sentimental. Gerald will talk — I know him — 
and I will cry, and how I would look to-morrow ! 
I want you to do a little fixing for me and to try 
my hair low and then high.” 

“ I like it high,” said Dr. Lake. 

“ 1 don’t. I like it low. Tessa you shall try it 
low, hke Nan Gerard’s. Say, Gerald, shall I put 
on my dress after she has fixed my hair and come 
down and let you see it.” 

“I think I have seen it. Didn’t you try it on 
for me and tell me that that fellow liked it? I 
hate that dress ; if you dress to please me, you will 
wear the one you have on now.” 

“This old thing! I see myself. No, I shall wear 
my wedding dress. It fits to perfection. I want 
to look pretty once in my life.” 

“You will never look prettier than you do this 
minute! Come here,” opening his arms towards 
her. 

“ No, I won’t. Let me alone. Dr. Lake.” 

Tessa was already on the stairs; Sue ran towards 
her laughing and screaming, the parlor door was 
closed with a bang. 

“Now he’s angry,” cried Sue, tripping on the 
stairs. “I don’t care; he wants me to stay and 
talk sentiment, and I hate being sentimental. And, 
Tessa, you sha’n’t talk to me, either.” 

“Where is , your father ? ” inquired Tessa, stand- 
ing on the thr^&shold of Sue’s chamber. , 

“ In the dining-room drying his feet and drink- 
ing a cup of coffee.” 


THE NIGHT BEFORE. 


275 


“Don’t you want to go down and say good night? 
He will lose every thing when he loses you.” 

Sue hesitated. “ I don’t know how to be tender 
and loving, I should make a fool of myself; he isn’t 
over and above pleased with this thing anyway; 
he never did pet me as your father has petted you. 
Your father is like a mother. He said once when 
I was a little girl that he wished that I had died 
and Freddie had lived; Freddie was two years older 
and as bright as a button. Father loved him. I 
shall never forget that ; I shall never forgive him no 
matter how kind he is to me. And he swears at mQ 
when he is angry with me ; he used to, but Gerald 
told him that he should not swear at Aw wife ! Fa- 
ther said that he didn’t mean any thing by it. Ger- 
ald will be kinder to me than father has been ; father 
swears at me in one breath and calls me the com- 
fort of his old age in the next. You can’t turn him 
into your father if you talk about him all nigjit.” 

“But he will be glad if you go down; he will 
think of it some day and so will you.” 

“ He isn’t sentimental and I can’t be. Besides I 
have some things to put into my trunk, and I want 
to put a ruffle into my wrapper that I may have it 
all ready. It’s eleven o’clock now; we shall not be 
asleep to-night.” 

Tessa urged no more; it was not her father who 
was drying his feet and drinking his coffee down- 
stairs alone on the night before her wedding day. 
How he would look at her and take her into his 
arms with tears. 


276 TUSSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 

Sue opened her trunk. “ Gerald’s things are all 
in. It does seem -queer to have his things packed 
up with mine. And when we come home every 
thing will go on just the same only I shall be Mrs. 
Lake instead of Miss Grey son.” 

As Tessa stood behind her arranging her hair, 
Sue said, “There, I like that. I almost look like 
Nan Gerard. What do you think she said to-day ? 
She was here with Mary Sherwood to see father 
and they saw Mr. Ealph in my album. ‘That’s 
the man I intend to marry,’ she said, ‘eyes, money, 
and all.’ Mary scolded her but she only laughed. 
She said that if she couldn’t get him, she should 
take the professor, for he was just as handsome 
and could talk about something beside paregoric 
and postmortem examinations.” 

Tessa said nothing. How she had pitied Nan 
Gerard, and how harshly she had misjudged . Dr. 
Towne. She was awakened in the night by Sue’s 
voice — 

“ Put your arm around me, Tessa.” 

The long night ended at last in the dull dawn, 
for it was raining still. Tessa had slept fitfully; 
Sue had lain perfectly quiet, not speaking again or 
•moving. 

At eleven o’clock Sue and Dr. Lake were mar- 
ried. Dr. Greyson sat with his head in his hands, 
turned away from them, his broad frame shaking 
from head to foot; Tessa did not look at Dr. Lake: 
she sat on a sofa beside Mrs. Towne, with her eyes 
fixed on the carpet. Sue cried and laughed to- 


THE NIGHT BEFORE. 


277 


gether when her father kissed her ; she drew her- 
self to the full height of Mrs. Gerald Lake, when 
Dr. Towne shook hands with her. At half past 
twelve the bride and bridegroom were driven to 
the depot; Tessa remained to give a few orders 
to the servants, and was then taken home in Dr. 
Towne’s carriage. 

“ It seems to me as lonely as a funeral,” she said; 
“ and Sue is laughing and eating chocolate cream 
drops this very minute. Marriage should be a leap 
into the sunshine.” 

“ I hope that yours will be,” her companion said 
in his gravest tone. 

“ If it ever is^ you may rest assured that it will 
be. It will be the very happiest sunshine that ever 
shone out of heaven.” 

She was learning to talk to Dr. Towne as easily 
as she talked to her father, for he was the one man 
in the world that she was sure that she would never 
marry ; she knew that he desired it as little as she 
did herself 

“ Why will it be so happy ? ” 

“ Because I shall wait till I am satisfied'' 

“ Satisfied with him? You will never be that.” 

“Then I shall wither in single blessedness; I 
shall be unhappily not married instead of unhap- 
pily married.” 

“ Philip Towne is your ideal.” 

“ I know it,” she said. “ I like to think that he 
is in the world. He makes me as happy as a 
pansy.” 


278 TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 


“ Women are never happy with their ideals.” 

“They seldom have an opportunity of testing 
it; Professor Towne has a pure heart and he has 
brains.” 

Dr. Towne answered in words that she never 
forgot, “That is what he says of you.” 

“ Oh, I am so glad ! I like to have that said of 
me better than any thing.” 

She remembered, but she would not tell him, 
that a lady had said of him, having seen him but 
a few moments, and not having heard him speak, 
that he was a “ rock.” 

“And I love rocks and know all about them,” 
she had added. 

“They give shadow in a weary land,” Tessa had 
thought. “ I have been in a weary land and he has 
mt been a shadow to me.” 

After a silent moment he spoke, “Don’t you 
think that you were rather hard on me last week ? ” 

“ Yes,” she said frankly, “ I have thought it all 
over ; I intended to tell you that I was sorry ; I am 
sorry; I will not do so again.” 

“ Till next time ? ” 

“There shall not be any next time; in my 
thoughts 1 have been very unjust to you; I have 
come nearer hating, really hating you, than any 
other person I ever knew. I am sorry ; I am al- 
ways sorry to be unjust.” 

One look into the sunshiny eyes satisfied her 
that she was forgiven. It almost seemed as if 
they were on the old confidential footing. 


THE NIGHT BEFORE. 


279 


“ Have you gathered any autumn leaves ? ” he 
asked. 

“Yes, some beautiful ones. I did not get any 
last year — ” She stopped, confused. 

She had lived through her year without him. 
Was he remembering last October, too ? 

About sunset it cleared; she was glad for Dr. 
Lake’s sake; about the bride she did not think; 
Sue would be thankful if none of her bridal finery 
were spoiled. 

The evening mail brought a letter from Dinah. 

There were two pieces of news in it, in both of 
which Tessa was interested. The school - master 
was twenty-one years of age, “a lovable fellow, 
the room grows dark when he goes out of it, and 
he likes best the books that I do.” This came first, 
she read on to find that Professor Towne’s mother 
and sister had come this summer to the house over 
the way, that Miss Towne was “ perfectly lovely ” 
and had been an invalid for fifteen years, not hav- 
ing put her foot to the ground in all that time ; she 
could move about on the first floor, but passed most 
of her time in a chair, reading, writing, and doing 
the most beautiful fancy work. She was beautiful, 
like Professor Towne, but the mother was only a 
fussy old lady. Her name was Sarepta ! 

Dinah’s letters were rather apt to be ecstatic and 
incoherent. Tessa wrote five pages in her book 
that night and a foolscap sheet to Dinah. 

She fell asleep thinking of what Professor Towne 
had said about her. 


XVIIL 


MOODS. 

All through the month of October she felt cross, 
sometimes she looked cross, but she did not speak 
one cross word, not evenfonce; she was not what 
we call “sweet” in her Happiest moods, but she 
was thoroughly sound in her temper and often a 
little, just a very little, sharp. Never sharp to 
her father, however, because she reverenced him, 
and never to her mother because she was pitiful 
towards her; she could appreciate so few of life’s 
best havings and givings, that Tessa could never 
make her enjoyment less by speaking the thoughts 
that, at times, almost forced their own utterance; 
therefore her mood was kept to herself all through 
the month. 

There was no month in the year that she loved 
as well as she loved October; in any of its days it 
was a trial to be kept within doors. 

She would have phrased her mood as “cross” 
if she had had the leisure or the inclination to 
keep a diary; she had kept a journal during the 
first year of her friendship with Ralph Towne and 


MOODS. 


281 


had burned it before the year was ended in one of 
her times of being ashamed of herself 

One of the happenings that irritated her was the 
finding in her desk a scrap of a rhyme that she 
had written one summer day after a talk with 
Kalph Towne ; she dropped it into the parlor grate 
chiding herself for ever having been so nonsen- 
sical and congratulating herself upon having out- 
grown it. 

It was called The Silent Side and was the story 
of a maiden wandering in the twilight up a lane 
bordered with daisies, somebody didn’t come and 
her eyes grew tired of* watching and her heart 
beat faint with waiting, so she wandered down 
the daisy-bordered lane ! She did feel a little ten- 
der over the last lines even if she were laughing 
over it: 


“ * Father,’ she said, ‘ I may not say. 

But will you not tell him I love him so ? 

Had any one in all the world of maidenhood be- 
side her ever prayed such a prayer? Old words 
came to her: “Thou knowest my foolishness.” 

The rhyme was dated the afternoon that Ralph 
Towne had said — but what right had she to re- 
member any thing that he had said? He had 
forgotten and despised her for remembering; but 
he could not despise her as much as she despised 
herself! 

Why was it that understanding him as she cer- 
tainly did understand him, that she knew that she 


282 TESSA WADSWORTH^S DISCIPLINE. 


would fly to the ends of the earth with him if he 
should take her hand and say, “Come”; that is, 
she was afraid that she would. It was no marvel 
that the knowledge gave her a feeling of discomfort, 
of intense dissatisfaction with herself ; how woeful- 
ly wrong she must be for such a thing to be true ! 

On the blank side of a sheet of manuscript, she 
scribbled a stanza that haunted her; it gave ex- 
pression to the life she had lived during the two 
years just passed. 

“A nightingale made a mistake; 

She sang a few notes out of tune; 

Her heart was ready to break, 

And she hid from the moon.” 

In this month her book was accepted ; that check 
for two hundred and six dollars gave pleasure that 
she and others remembered all their lives ; with this 
check came one for fifteen dollars for Dinah ; she al- 
most laughed her crossness away over Dine’s little 
check. 

Dine’s reply was characteristic : 

“Thus endeth my first and last venture upon the 
literary sea; I follow in your wake no longer. 

“ If it were matrimony now — 

“John (isn’t John a grand, strong name ?) doesn’t 
like literary women. He reads Owen Meredith to 
me, and Miss Mulock. He says that I am like Miss 
Mulock’s Edna"' 

Each letter of Dine’s teemed with praises of John 
Woodstock; she thought that he was like Adam 
Bede, or Ninian in “ Head of the Family,” or per- 


MOODS. 


283 


haps Max in “A Life for a Life”; she was lonely 
all day long .without him, and as happy as she 
could be on earth with him all the long evenings. 

Tessa frowned over the letters; Dine made no 
allusion to him in letters written to her father and 
mother; her whole loving, girlish heart she poured 
out to Tessa. And Tessa cried over them and 
prayed over them. 

Sue returned from her bridal tour undeniably 
miserable; even the radiant mood of Dr. Lake was 
much subdued. Tessa met them together at Mrs. 
Towne’s one evening, two days after the coming 
home, and was cut to the heart by their manner 
towards each other: she was defiant; he, imploring. 

“I’m sorry I’m married any way,” she exclaimed. 

“ Don’t say that,” he remonstrated, his face flush- 
ing painfully. 

“I will say it — I do say it ! I am sorry 1 ” 

“You know that you don’t mean it.” 

“Yes, I do mean it, too.” 

Dr. Towne glanced at Tessa and gave an em- 
barrassed laugh. Mrs. Towne’s expression became 
severe; Tessa could have shaken Sue. Nan Gerard 
turned on the music stool with her most perfect 
laugh ; Tessa could have shaken her for the enlight- 
enment that ran through it. 

“We will have no more music after that,” said 
Professor Towne. 

Sue bade Tessa good night holding both her 
hands. “ I wish I had married Stacey,” she whis- 
pered. 


284 TESSA WADSWORTH^ S DISCIPLINE. 


“ Don’t tell Dr. Lake, I beg of you.” 

“ Oh, he knows it. Come and see me.” 

“ No, I will not. .You shall not talk to me about 
your husband.” 

“ I will if I want to. You must come.” 

“Do come,” urged Dr. Lake coming towards 
them. But she would not promise. 

The last Saturday evening in October found Tessa 
alone before the fire in Mrs. Towne’s sitting-room ; 
Mrs. Towne was not well, and had sent for her to 
come; she had gone to her sleeping room imme- 
diately after tea, and asked Tessa to come to her in 
two hours. 

She was in a “ mood ” ; so she called it to herself, 
a mood in which self-analysis held the prominent 
place; her heart was aching, she knew not for 
what, she hardly cared, if the aching might be 
taken away and she could go to sleep and then 
awake to find the sun shining. 

For the last hour she had been curled up in a 
crimson velvet chair, part of the time with her 
head bowed upon the arm ; there were tears on her 
eyelashes, on her fingers, and on the crimson velvet. 
In the low light, she was but a gray figure crowned 
with chestnut braids, and only that Kalph Towne 
saw when he entered noiselessly through the half 
open door. 

Tessa thought that no one in the world moved 
so gently or touched her so lightly as Kalph Towne. 
He stood an instant beside her before she stirred, 
then she raised her head slowly, ashamed of her 


MOODS. 


285 


flushed, wet cheeks. She could not hide from the 
moon. 

“Well?” she said, thinking of her eyes and 
cheeks. 

“Are you dreaming dreams alone, here in the 
dark?” 

“I’m afraid so; I dream too many dreams; I 
want something real; I do not like the stuft* that 
dreams are made of.” 

“You are real enough.” He leaned against the 
low mantel with one elbow resting upon it; she 
did not lift her eyes; she was afraid. Had he 
come to say something to her? 

“Miss Tessa.” 

She did not reply, she was rubbing her fingers 
over the crimson velvet. 

“ I have been thinking of something that I wish 
to say to you.” 

“Well, I am approachable,” in a light, saucy 
voice. 

“Think well before you speak; it is a question 
that, middle-aged as I am, I never asked any wo- 
man before; I want to ask you to become my wife.” 

She had raised her eyes in surprise, unfeigned 
surprise. 

“You need not look like that,” he said irritably; 
“you look as if you had never thought of it.” 

“I have not — for a long time; perhaps I did 
once — before I became old and wise. I am sur- 
prised, I can not understand it ; I was so sure that 
you could never care for me.” 


286 T£:SSA WADSWORTH^S DISCIPLINE. 


“Why should I not? It is the most natural thing 
in the world.” 

“I do not think so; I can not understand.” 

“Accept it upon my testimony, do not try to un- 
derstand it.” 

He betrayed no feeling, except in his quickened 
tone ; she was too bewildered to be conscious of any 
feeling at all; she listened to the sound of her own 
voice, as if another were speaking ; she remembered 
afterward, that for once in her life she had heard 
the sound of her own voice. She was thinking, 
“My voice is pleasant, only so cold and even.” 

“Will you not answer me?” 

She was thinking; she had forgotten to answer. 

“Why should you like me?” she said at last. 

“There’s reason enough, allow me to judge; but 
you do not come to the point.” 

“ I do not know how.” 

“ I thought that coming to the point was one of 
your excellences.” 

“Your question — ^your assertion rather — is some- 
thing very new.” 

She could see the words ; she was reciting them 
from a printed page. 

“ Don’t you know whether you like me or not? ” 
he asked in the old assured, boyish way. 

“No, I do not know that; if I did I should care 
for what you are saying, and now I do not care. 
Once, in that time when I loved you and you did 
not care, I would have died with joy to hear you 
say what you have said; my heart would have 


MOODS. 


287 


stopped beating; I should have been too glad to 
live; but perhaps when that you went away and 
died, the Tessa that loved you went away and 
died, too. I think that I did die — of shame. Now 
I hear you speak the words that I used to pray 
then every night that you might speak to me, and 
now I do not care ! When I was little I cried my- 
self sick once for something I wanted, and when 
mother gave it to me 1 was too sick and tired to 
care. No, I do not want to marry you. Dr. Towne. 
I am too sick and tired to love you.” 

“Why do you not want to marry me ? ” 

“Because — because — ” she looked up into his 
grave eyes — “I do not want to; I am not satisfied 
with you.” 

“ Why are you not satisfied with me ? ” 

“ I do not know.” 

“Are you disappointed in me ? Have I changed ? ” 
“ Oh, no,” she said sorrowfully, “ you have not 
changed — not since I have known you this time. 
It is like this, as if I were blind when I knew you 
before, and I loved you for what you were to me ; 
but as I could not see you, I loved you for what I 
imagined you to be, and now, I am not blind, my 
eyes are wide, wide open, and I look at you and 
wonder ‘where is the one I knew?’ I do not 
know you ; you are a stranger to me ; I would love 
you if I could ; I can not say yes and not love you. 
I have never told any one, but I may tell you now. 
While you were away at St. Louis, I promised to 
marry some one; he had loved me all my life, and 


288 TESSA WADSWORTH^ S DISCIPLINE. 


I was SO heart-broken because of the mistake that I 
had made about you; and I wanted some one to 
care for me, so that I might forget how I loved 
somebody that did not love me. And then I was 
wild when I knew what I had done ! I did not 
love him ; I felt as if I were bound in iron ; I shall 
never forget that. I do not want to feel bound in 
iron to you. Why did you not ask me last year 
when you knew how I cared for you ? ” 

He dropped his eyes, the hot color flushing even 
to his forehead. “ I could not — sincerely.” 

“ Why did you act as if you liked me ? ” 

“ I did like you. I did not love you. I did not 
understand. I can not tell you how unhappy I 
was when I found that you had misunderstood me. 
I would not have hurt you for all the universe ; I 
did not dream that you could misunderstand me ; I 
was attracted to you ; I did not know that I mani- 
fested any stronger feeling. Surely you have for- 
given me.” 

“Yes, I have forgiven you; I did not really 
blame you; I knew that you did not understand. 
You are a stupid fellow about women. — You are 
only a stupid, dear, big boy.” 

“ But you do not answer me.” 

“ I have answered you. Do you ask me sincerely 
now ? ” she asked curiously. 

“You know I do,” he said angrily. 

“Do you ask me because Miss Gerard has re- 
fused you?” with a flash of merriment crossing 
her face. 


MOODS. 


289 


“ I never asked Miss Gerard.” 

“ Did you flirt with her ? ” 

“I suppose you give it that name. I was at- 
tracted towards her, of course, but I soon found 
that she had no depth; she would cling to me, I 
could not shake her ofi*. 1 took her to Mayfield 
this morning; she asked to go, I could not refuse 
the girl. She has made several pretty things for 
me; I showed my appreciation by buying pieces 
of jewelry for her; was that flirting? I never 
kissed her, or said I loved her, or talked any non- 
sense to her.” 

“ Of course not. You do not know how.” 

“ I know how to talk sense. Miss Tessa.” 

“ Are you asking me because your mother loves 
me so much ? ” 

“ Is it so hard for you to believe that I love you?” 

“ Yes,” she said, her eyes filling at his tone, “ I 
can not believe it. It is as if you had put both 
hands around my throat and choked my breath 
away and then said politely, ‘ Excuse me.’ ” 

“ Is my love so little to you as that ? ” 

“ I have not seen it yet ; you say you love me, 
that is all.” 

“ Is not that enough ? ” 

“It can not be enough, for it does not satisfy 
me. I have believed so long that you despised 
me; one word from you can not change it all.” 

“ Is there something wrong about me ? ” 

“Wrong? Oh, no. How could there be? I do 
believe that you are a good man.” 


290 TESSA WADSWORTff^S DISCIPLINE. 


“You think that you can not be happy with 
me ? ” he asked patiently. 

“ I am happy enough always, everywhere ; I was 
as happy as a bird in a tree before I knew you ; you 
set me to crjdng for something, and then held out 
your hand empty.” 

“ I love you; isn’t that full enough? ” 

“No, that is not full enough. I want you to he 
all that I believed you to be. I shall not be satis- 
fied till then. When you think of me you may 
think of me hungering and thirsting for you to be 
all that I can dream of your being — all that God is 
willing to make you.” 

The light had died out of his eyes. 

“ Do you know some one that does satisfy you ? ” 

“I know good people, but they do not satisfy 
me.” 

“ Philip Towne ? ” 

“I should as soon think of loving St. John.” 

“ Tell me, do you love him ? ” 

“ Dr. Towne, I never thought of such a thing ! ” 
she said with quick indignation. 

“You are a Mystic; Dr. Lake has named you 
true. Come, be sensible and don’t talk riddles ; 
don’t talk like a book; talk plain, good sense; say 
yes., and leave all your whims behind you forever.” 

“Loving you was a whim; shall I leave that 
behind forever?” 

“ Yes.” 

“Then I could not endure your presence; it is 
that that keeps you near me now. It is not enough 


MOODS. 


291 


for you to love me ; I should die of hunger if I did 
not love you.” 

“ Love me, then.” 

Her head went down upon the arm of the chair ; 
she covered her face with both hands; a childish 
attitude she often assumed when alone. 

“ I can’t, I can’t ! I want to ; I would if I could ! 
it’s too late; I can’t go back and see you as you 
were — ” 

“ I have asked you to forgive me.” 

“ I do, I do ; but I do not love you as I want to 
love you. I shall never marry any one, you may 
be sure of that ; I do not want to be married. Why 
must I ? Who says I must?” 

“I say so.” 

“Your authority I do not recognize. The voice 
must come from God to my own heart.” 

“ Lift your head. Look at me.” 

She obeyed. 

“I wish you to understand that I am not to be 
trifled with; this is definite; this is final; I have 
asked and you have refused. You need not play 
with me thinking that I shall ask you again, I 
never shall. Kemember, I never shall.” 

“ I do not wish you to ask me again.” 

“Then this ends the matter.” 

“ This ends the matter,” she repeated. 

“My mother is not well, she will miss you; you 
will stay with her just the same. She will not sur- 
mise any thing. She loves you as I did not know 
that one woman could love another.” 


292 TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 


“ Is that why you wish to marry me ? ” 

“No. I know my own mind. I have loved you 
ever since I knew you, but I was not aware of it ; 
I did not know it until I knew that Miss Gerard 
was not like you.” 

“ Oh, I am so sorry! This is the hardest of all. 
But I might grow not to like you at all ; I might 
rush away from you; it takes so much love and 
confidence and sympathy to be willing to give 
one’s self.” 

“ I am not in a frame of mind to listen to such 
things ; you forget that you have thrown me away 
for the sake of a whim I ” 

“ I want to tell your mother ; I can not bear for 
her to be so kind to me — ” 

“ It isn’t enough to hurt me, but you must hurt 
her, also. She would not understand — any more 
than I do — why you throw me away.” 

“ I will not tell her, but I shall feel like a hypo- 
crite. You will not utterly despise me.” 

“You can not expect me to feel very kindly 
towards you. Why may I not lose all but the 
memory of you?'"' 

“You may. I am willing,” she answered wearily. 

“ Oh, I wanted to be satisfied with you.” 

He had left the room with his last words, not 
waiting for reply. 

And she could only cry out, with a dry, hard 
sob, “Oh, Kalph, Kalph, I wanted to be satisfied 
with you 1 ” 


XIX. 

THE OLD STORY. 

One afternoon in the reading-room she found two 
notices of her book; one was in Hearth and Home^ 
the other in The iMtheran Observer; the former ran 
in this style: 

“‘Under the Wings’ by Theresa Louise Wads- 
worth is the most lifelike representation of a gen- 
uine live boy that we have seen for many a day. 
We are almost tempted to think that the author 
was once a boy herself she is so heartily in sym- 
pathy with a boy’s thoughts and feelings. It is a 
book that every boy ought to read, and we are con- 
fident that no boy can read it without being bet- 
tered by it.” 

The other she was more pleased with : 

“ Kob is a genuine boy, with all manner of faults 
and pranks ; but a tender, truthful heart, and a de- 
termination for the right that brings him through 
safely. But specially is he delightful in juxtaposi- 
tion with Nell, a little girl who says the quaintest 
things in the most laughable, most lovable manner. 
Altogether it is a thoroughly enjoyable book, sweet 


294 TESSA WADSWORTH'S DISCIPLINE. 

and saintly, too ; though not saintly after the cut 
and dried style of youthful piety.” 

She turned the papers with a startled face as if 
the lady in the black cloak near her had guessed 
what she had looked for and had found ; as if the 
blonde mustache hidden behind Emerson surmised 
that she had written a book and wondered why 
she had not attempted something deeper; as if 
Mr. Lewis Gesner reading a newspaper with his 
forehead puckered into a frown knew that she 
was slightly a blue - stocking, and decided that 
5he might better be learning how to be a good 
wife for somebody. 

“I am commonplace,” she soliloquized, running 
down the long flight of stairs; “ten years ago when 
my heroines were Rosalie and Viola, and their lovers 
bandits or princes in disguise, who would have be- 
lieved that I could have settled down into writing 
good books for good little children?” 

That evening Mr. Hammerton took from his 
memorandum book three square inches of printed 
matter, neatly and exactly folded, and dropped it 
into her hand. 

“There’s a feather in your cap. Lady Blue; it is 
plucked from the Evening Mail." 

She read it, by the light of the shaded lamp, 
standing at the sitting-room table. Mrs. Wads- 
worth looked up from her work, regarding her curi- 
ously ; Tessa did not observe the expression of pride 
and love that flitted across her face. Mrs. Wads- 
worth loved Tessa more than she loved any other 


THE OLD STORY. 


295 


human being; indeed, with all her capacity for lov- 
ing ; but Tessa would never discover it. Mrs. Wads- 
worth was not aware of it, herself; Mr. Wadsworth 
saw it and was glad. Tessa read eagerly : 

‘“Under the Wings’ is the title of an excellent 
book by Theresa Louise Wadsworth issued in neat 

form by . The characters of the boyish hero — 

wilful, merry, irreverent, honest, and bold, and the 
heroine — happy, serious, inquiring, and lovable, are 
drawn with no mean skill, while the other person- 
ages, the kind and pious grandmother, the snappish, 
but well-meaning mother, the deacon, and others, 
are sketched with scarcely less truth and vividness. 
The development of the Christian faith in the soul 
of wild Kob is traced easily and naturally, the in- 
cidents are numerous and interesting; the whole 
movement of the story is in helpful sympathy with 
human hearts.” 

“What is it, daughter?” inquired her father ar- 
ranging the chessmen. 

“She is modest as well a& famous. I will read 
it,” said Mr. Hammerton, “and here’s your letter 
from Dine ; I knew that that would insure my wel- 
come. Do you know, I forgot to inquire for my- 
self? I never did such a thing before. Father will 
go to the mail, however.” 

Moving apart from the group, she ran through 
the long letter ; coloring and biting her lips as she 
read. Mrs. Wadsworth’s little rocker was drawn to 
the table ; the light from the tall lamp fell over her 
face and hair, touching her hands and her work; 


296 TjESSA WADSWORTH'S DISCIPLINE. 


the low, white forehead, the wavy hair, the pretty 
lips and chin were pleasant to look upon; when 
she was in a happy state of mind, this little lady 
was altogether kissable. 

“What does Dine say?” she asked. 

“ Not much. No news,” stammered Tessa. ' 

“ Hurry then and let me read it.” 

“Excuse me, it is purely confidential, every ves- 
tige to be consigned to the fiames. You are to 
have a letter in a day or two.” 

Mr. Hammerton gave her a quick glance and 
moved his queen into check. She took the letter 
into the parlor for a second perusal. 

“Oh, Tessa, my dear, big, wise sister, I’ve got 
something to tell you. What should I do if I 
hadn’t somebody to tell? At first I thought I 
wouldn’t tell you or any body, and then I knew 
I must. Norah knows, but she will never tell. 
She does not know about Gus. I have never told 
that, but she knows about my wonderful John ! I 
don’t know how to begin either; I guess I will be- 
gin in the middle; all the blanks your own imag- 
ination must fill. You know all about John; I’ve 
told you enough if your head isn’t too full of lit- 
erary stuff to hold common affairs ; Tm in love and 
he is, too, of course. I should not be if he were 
not. I mean I should not tell of it if he were not. 
I’m glad that you are not the kind of elder sister 
that can’t be told such things, for I could not tell 
mother, and I would not dare tell dear, old father. 


THE OLD STORY. 


297 


Not that it is so dreadful to be in love, even 
if I have known him but seven weeks to-night ; I 
fell in love with him the instant he raised his eyes 
and took hold of my hand. Living under the same 
roof and eating together three times a day (he eats 
so nicely), and ciphering and studying and reading 
together, and going to church and prayer-meeting 
and singing-school together, make the time seem 
ten times as long and give twenty times as many 
opportunities of falling in love decorously as I 
could have found in Dunellen in a year! But I 
am not apologizing for that. It’s too delightfully 
delicious to have a real lover! Not that he has 
asked me yet ! I wouldn’t have him do it for any 
thing ; it would spoil it all. But we both knew it 
as Adam and Eve knew it ! Now the dreadfulness 
of it is that I have no right to do such a thing. I 
came here believing that I was lawfully and for- 
ever engaged to dear old Gus, spectacles, chess- 
board, dictionary and all. Not that he ever said 
a word to me! Don’t you know one night I told 
you that I had a secret? How glad I was of it 
then ! I couldn’t sleep that night and for days I 
felt dizzy ; for Gus had been my hero ever since he 
told me stories when I was a wee child. And so 
of course I thought I Ixyved him. What is love, 
anyway ? Who knows ? That secret was this : I 
heard dear, old, wise Gus tell father that he loved 
me (just think, me I) and that he was waiting for 
me to love him, dear, old boy ! He would not try 
to make me love him, he wanted it to come natu- 


298 TjSSsa wadswortws discipline. 


rally; he would not speak to me or urge me, he 
wanted to find me loving him and then he would 
ask me to give him what belonged to him. Wasn’t 
it touching? I didn’t know that he could be so 
lover-like. I didn’t know that he ever would love 
anybody because he always talks books and politics 
and only made fun when I told him news about the 
girls. How could I help loving him when I knew 
that he loved me. Isn’t that enough to make any- 
body love anybody ? 

“Just as soon as I saw my wonderful John, then 
I knew that I did not love Gus, that I never had 
loved him, that I never could love him. No, not to 
the end of time. If I had married him, I suppose 
that I should have been satisfied and thought I 
was as happy as I could be — I don’t know, though. 
He was wise to let me wait and have a choice : it 
is cruel to ask girls before they have seen some one 
else ; we do not know what we do want until we 
see it — or him. I am writing at the sitting-room 
table; John has not come home from the mail; 
Aunt Tessa knits a long, blue stocking and Uncle 
Knox is asleep with the big white and black cat on 
his knees. 

“ I never could stay here but for John and Miss 
Towne. I have told lier about John; she likes 
John. Every one does. 

“ I want you to see my knight; he is not tall, he 
is broad-shouldered, with the loveliest complexion 
and blonde mustache, blue eyes, shining blue eyes, 
and auburn curly hair! that is, mtJier auburn; I 


THE OLD STORY. 


299 


think it is more like reddish gold. I wish that 
you could hear him talk about making life a glori- 
ous success. He makes me feel brave and strong. 
Oh, isn’t it a beautiful thing to live and have some 
one love you ! I wish that you loved somebody; I 
do not like to be so happy and have you standing 
out in the cold. John thinks that you are wonder- 
ful ; I tell him that he will forget me when he has 
heard you talk. 

“ Wise old Gus is a thousand miles over my head 
when he talks to me, but John walks by my side 
and speaks the thoughts that I have been thinking, 
only in so much more beautiful language; and he 
likes all the books I like, and my favorite poems 
and hymns. How will you break it to Gus ? He 
must be told. He wrote to me two weeks ago, a 
long, interesting letter all about Dunellen news, 
which I haven’t dared answer yet. I suppose I 
must. I showed it to John; he asked how old he 
was, and now he calls him ‘The Venerable.’ He 
must not keep on thinking about me, for I never, 
never can like him, even if I never marry John. 
Do break it to him in some easy, pleasant way ; he 
will never imagine that you know that Jie likes me. 
He never showed it any, I am sure. I always 
thought that it was you, and mother thinks so ; I 
heard her telling father. 

“ Be sure to write immediately, for I am as un- 
happy as I can be. And be sure to tell me what 
he says and how he takes it. Mary Sherwood wrote 
me that Sue told her that she and Dr. Lake had 


300 TESSA WADSlVORTff^S DISCIPLINE, 


awful quarrels, and that once they didn’t speak to 
each other for three days only in her father’s pres- 
ence. I never could quarrel with John. There he 
comes. I’ll be writing when he comes in and not 
look up, and then he will come behind my chair 
and touch my curls when auntie isn’t looking. 

Write soon. Your ever loving Dine. 

^ “P. S. — John calls me Di: he doesn’t like Dine," 

Crumbling the letter in both hands, she laid it 
upon the coals; then she stood with one foot on the 
fender, leaning forward with her forehead upon the 
mantel, thinking, thinking. Before she was aware 
the door was opened and some one came behind 
her and put both arms around her. 

“ Is any thing the matter with Dine ? ” 

“Oh, no,” shaking herself loose from his arms 
and creeping out of them. 

He pushed the ottoman nearer and seated him- 
self upon the parrot and the roses ; she stood on the 
edge of the rug, with her arms folded across her 
breast to keep herself quiet ; how could she tell him 
the truth ? He was not a boy to laugh and cry and 
fling it off; he had loved Dine as long as Felix Har- 
rison had loved her! He would take it quietly 
enough ; she had no dread of an outburst ; it might 
be that Dine’s silence in regard to his letter had 
been a preparation; surely every hard thing that 
came had its preparation; the heavy blow was 
never sent before the word of warning. 

“ She is not sick ? ” he asked. 


THE OLD STORY. 


301 


“ Sick ! ” She lingered over the word as if help 
would come before it were ended. “ Oh, no, she is 
well and happy.” 

“ Does she write you secrets ? ” 

“ She always tells me her secrets.” 

“ Has any phenomenon occurred ? ” 

“ It isn’t a phenomenon ; it is something as old 
as Eve and as new as Dinah. She thinks she has 
found her Adam.” 

“Ah!” in a constrained voice. 

She saw nothing but the fire ; the long poker was 
laid across the fender, a handful of ashes had fallen 
through the grate. “Such things have to come, 
like the measles and mumps; I did hope, however, 
to keep her out of the contagion. But Mother Na- 
ture is wiser than any sister.” 

“Why is it to be regretted?” 

“ Because — oh, because, I have learned that one’s 
eyes are always wide open afterward — they weep 
much and see clear; one can never be carelessly 
happy again ; I wanted her to stay a little girl. Self- 
ishly, perhaps. I thought there was time enough.” 
“ It is settled then — so soon ? ” 

“Nothing is settled, but that two people are in 
love, or believe themselves to be. Am I not a cyn- 
ical elder sister ? ” 

“ Is this her first experience ? ” 

“ Who can say when a first experience is ! Ten- 
nyson and moonlight walks are aggravating at their 
age.” At their age I She felt as old as Miss Jewett 
to-night. 


302 TESSA WADSWORTH'S DISCIPLINE. 

“ I hope he is worthy of her. She is a jewel.” 

“ She would not love him if he were not,” said 
the elder sister proudly. 

“ This is a secret ? ” 

“Yes; I know that I can trust you. It will be 
time enough to tell father and mother when he 
brings her home and kneels at their feet for their 
blessing.” 

“Who is he?” 

“John Woodstock, the school-master. He has 
neither father nor mother, he is beautiful and good, 
enthusiastic and fascinating.” 

She had not once lifted her eyes to his face ; his 
fingers had clasped and unclasped themselves; his 
voice was not as steady as usual. 

“ That notice was a very pretty puff. Lady Blue.” 

“Yes, I like it. I will paste it into my note- 
book.” 

“ Is that all you have seen?” 

“No, I saw two in the reading-room, but I like 
this better.” 

“Are you writing now?” 

“Yes.” 

“You are not on the lookout for Adam.” 

“ No. I will write and he shall search for me. 
Haven’t you heard of that bird in Africa, which if 
you hunt for him, you can not find, but if you stay 
at home, he will come to you ? ” 

He had risen and stood in his usual uneasy fash- 
ion. “ My congratulations to Dine.” 

“ I will tell her.” 


THE OLD STORY. 


303 


He lingered on the hearth-rug, then at the door 
with his hand upon the knob. 

“ Good night. I shall be busy for a week or two ; 
do not expect to see me.” 

“You will come when you can?” 

“ Certainly.” He went out and closed the door- 

She stood in the same position with her arms 
folded for the next h&’ hour. How could Dine 
know what love was ? How could she give up a 
man like Gus Hammerton for a light-haired boy 
who talked of making life a glorious success ? He 
had his heartache now; it had come at last after 
all his years of watching Dine growing up : and no 
one could help him, he must fight it out alone ; she 
remembered what he had said about quoting from 
a book for Dr. Lake. What “book man” could 
help him to-night? Would he open a book or fall 
upon his knees ? 

Was he sorrowful to-night too, Kalph Towne? 
How gentle he had been with her and how pa- 
tient ! They had met several times since ; once, in 
his mother’s presence, when he had spoken to her 
as easily as usual ; at other times in the street ; he 
had lifted his hat and passed on ; the one glimpse 
of his eyes had been to reveal them very dark and 
very stern. She could hear Mr. Hammerton’s voice 
calling back to her father from the gate ; they both 
laughed and then his quick tramp sounded on the 
planks. 

The tramp kept on and on for hours; the moon 
arose late; he walked out into the country, now 


304 TESSA WADSWORTH'S DISCIPLINE. 


tramping along the wayside and now in the road; 
it was midnight when he turned his face homeward 
and something past one when he silently unlocked 
the door with his night-key and found his way to 
his room. There was a letter there from Dinah ; 
his sister had laid it on his bureau. It was brief, 
formal, and ambiguous; she had subscribed herself 
“Your young, old friend, D.” She did not say that 
she was glad of his letter, she did not ask him to 
write again. “ She thinks that she must not write 
to me,” he thought, “darling little Dine! I would 
like to see that John Woodstock 1 ” 


XX. 


SEVERAL THINGS. 

The November sky was full of clouds; Tessa liked 
a cloudy sky ; the dried leaves whirled around her 
and rustled beneath her feet, fastening themselves 
to her skirt as she walked through them ; she had 
stepped down into the gutter to walk through the 
leaves because they reminded her of her childish 
days when she used to walk through them and soil 
her stockings and endure a reprimand when her 
mother discovered the cause of it; then she had 
liked the sound of the leaves, now she only cared 
for them, as she did for several other things, — for 
the sake of the long ago past ! She imagined her- 
self a ten-year-old maiden with big blue eyes and 
long, bright braids hanging down her back and 
tied together at the ends with brown ribbon ; she 
was coming from school with a Greenleaf s Arith- 
metic (she ciphered in long division and had a 
“table” to learn) “Parker’s Philosophy ” and “Mag- 
nall’s Questions ” in her satchel. The lesson to-mor- 
row in that was about Tilgath-pilneser ; she had 
stumbled over the queer napae, so she would be 
sure to remember it. There were crumbs in the 


306 TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 

napkin in the satchel, too, she had had seed cake 
for lunch; and a lead pencil that Felix Harrison 
had sharpened for her at noon, when he had come 
down-stairs to ask Laura for his share of the lunch, 
and there was a half sheet of note paper with her 
spelling for to-morrow from “ Scholar’s Companion ” 
written on it; perhaps there was a poorly written 
and ill-spelled note from Gus Hammerton’s cous- 
in, Mary Sherwood, and there might be a crochet 
needle and a spool of twenty cotton ! 

She smiled over the inventory, lingering over 
each article ; oh, if she only were going home from 
school with that satchel, to help her mother a little, 
play with Dine, and in the evening to look over her 
lessons sitting close to her father and then to coax 
him for a story. And then she would go to bed at 
eight o’clock to awake in the morning to another 
day. Mr. Hammerton said that it was a premature 
^^Vanitas vanitatem" for her to declare that “grow- 
ing up ” was as bad as any thing a girl could dream ! 

But then he did not know about poor Felix, and 
he could never guess what she had dreamed that 
she had found in Ralph Towne — and how empty 
life was because of this thing that had mocked her. 
Empty with all its fulness because of something 
that never had been ; something that never could 
be in him. 

In those satchel-days her greatest trouble had 
been an interminable scolding from her mother, or 
the having to give to Dine her own share of cup- 
custard, when one chanced to be left from tea. 


SEVERAL THINGS. 


307 


It was a raw day ; the wind played roughly with 
her veil ; the fields were bleak, and the long lines 
of fence, stretching in every direction and running 
into places that she did not know and would not 
care for, gave her a feeling of homesickness. Home- 
sickness with the home she had lived in all her life 
not a mile distant, with every one that she loved 
or ever had loved within three miles; every one 
but Dine, and Dine was as blithe and satisfied as 
any girl could be. 

Still she was homesick; she had been homesick 
since that evening by the fire in Mrs. Towne’s sit- 
ting-room. Homesick because she had dreamed a 
dream that could never come true ; now that he had 
asked her in plain, straightforward, manly words 
to love him and become his wife, her heart had 
opened, the light shone in, and she read all that 
the three years had written; she hod loved him, 
but the love had been crushed in shame — in shame 
for her mistake. 

“There she is now^" cried a voice in the distance 
behind her. 

She turned to find Dr. Lake stopping his horse; 
he sprang out, not lightly, not like himself, and as- 
sisted his wife to the ground. 

“ She prefers your company, it seems,” he said, 
holding the reins with one hand and giving Tessa 
the other. “Talk fast now, for 1 shall not be gone 
long; I want to get home.” 

“You can go home, I’ll come when I like,” re- 
plied Sue. 


308 TESSA IVADSWORTff^S DISCIPLINE. 

“We stopped at your house,” said Sue, as he 
drove on ; “I asked him to leave me while he goes 
to Harrison’s; that Felix is always having a fit or 
something. Do you think Gerald looks so sick?” 
squeezing her hand under the folds of Tessa’s crim- 
son and gray shawl that she might take her arm. 

“He is much changed; I did not like to look at 
him ; has he been ill ? ” 

“Oh, you didn’t hear then! It was day before 
yesterday! He was thrown out; the horse ran 
away ; he isn’t hurt much ; he thinks he is, I do be- 
lieve. I am not a nurse, I don’t know how to cod- 
dle people and fuss over them. The horse is a 
strange one that father had taken to try, and he 
threw Gerald out and ran away and smashed the 
buggy, and a farmer brought him home. He did 
look as white as a sheet and he hasn’t eaten any 
thing since; he went out yesterday and insisted 
upon coming out to-day. Father says that he’s fool- 
hardy; but I guess he knows that he isn’t hurt; I 
sha’n’t borrow trouble anyway. He mopes and feels 
blue, but he says nothing ails him ; he’s a doctor and 
he ought to know. Where are you going? ” 

“Not anywhere in particular; I came out for the 
air; we will walk on slowly.” 

“We might go as far as your seat on the roots. 
Wasn’t that time an age ago? 1 didn’t feel mar- 
ried-y one bit. I want to go over to Sherwoods to- 
night to the Sociable, but Gerald says that 1 am 
heartless to want to go. I don’t think I am. I 
didn’t get married to shut myself up. Gerald never 


SEVERAL THINGS. 


309 


has any time to go anywhere with me, and it’s just 
as stupid and vexatious at home as it ever was. 
Don’t you ever get married.” 

“Are you keeping your word?” 

“What word?” 

“The promise you made me that day by the 
brook.” 

“About Gerald? Oh, sometimes I keep it and 
sometimes I don’t. He always makes up first, I 
will say that for him. He will never let me go to 
sleep without kissing him good night.” 

“Then you did not tell Mary Sherwood that once 
you did not speak for three days?” 

“Bless you, no; Gerald would not let that be true; 
it was no goodness in me that it wasn’t true, though ; 
perhaps I told her that.” 

“ Do you talk to her about him ? ” 

“Now, Granny, suppose I do!” 

Tessa stood still. “Promise me — you shall not 
take another step with me till you do — that you 
will not talk to any one against him.” 

“I won’t. Don’t gripe my hand so tight. He is 
my husband, he isn’t yours I When he’s contrary. 
I’ll be contrary, too, and I’ll tell people if I like.” 

“Then you forfeit my friendship; remember I am 
not your friend.” 

“Tessa Wadsworth! you hateful old thing! you 
know I shall have to give in, for you are my best 
friend! There,” laughing, “let me go, and I’ll prom- 
ise ! I’ll say all the ugly things I have to say to his 
own face.” 


310 TESSA WADSWORTH^ S DISCIPLINE. 


They walked on slowly; Sue rambling on and 
Tessa listening with great interest. 

“I had a letter from Stacey last week; Gerald 
has it in his pocket ; he dictated the answer, and T 
wrote it in my most flourishing style. I’ve got 
somebody to take good care of me now — if he 
doesn’t get sick ! 1 don’t like sick people ; I made 

him some gruel yesterday and it was as thick as 
mush. Oh, the things he promises me when he 
gets rich ! Gets rich ! All he wants is for me to 
love him, poor dear ! What is love ? Do you 
know?” 

“To discover is one of the things I live for; 1 
know that it sulfers long.” 

“That’s poetry! I don’t want to suffer long and 
have Gerald sick. I had to get up last night and 
make him a mustard plaster, and do you believe I 
was so sleepy that I made it of ginger ? He never 
told me till this morning.” 

In half an hour he drove up swiftly behind them. 

“ Susan, you can get in ; I don’t feel like getting out 
to help you. I feel very bad, I want to get home.” 

He laid the reins in her hand. “You may drive; 
good-by, Mystic ; you and I will have our talk an- 
other day.” 

“ Come and see us,” Sue shouted back. 

The horse trotted on at good speed ; Sue’s blue 
veil floated backward; Tessa walked on thinking 
of Dr. Lake’s pain-stricken face and flgure. 

Her first words to Mary Sherwood that evening 
were: 


SEVERAL THINGS. 


311 


“ How is Dr. Lake ? ” 

“ Sick. Worse. Very sick, I suspect. Their girl . 
told our girl that Mrs. Lake was frightened almost 
to death.” 

“ I hope she is,” said Nan Gerard, “ she deserves 
to be.” 

Tessa kept herself in a sofa corner all the evening. 

Nan said that she was a queen surrounded by 
courtiers, for first one and then another came for a 
quiet talk. When she was not talking or listening, 
she was watching: figures, faces, voices, motions, 
all held something in them worth her studying; 
she had been watching under cover of a book of 
engravings Professor Towne, for some time before 
he came and stood at the arm of her sofa. 

She was shy, at first, as she ever was with stran- 
gers, but no one could be shy with him for a longer 
time than five minutes. Line’s last letter had con- 
tained an account of an afternoon with Miss Towne, 
with many quotations from her sayings. 

“My sister thinks that your sister is a saint,” said 
Tessa; “she has written me about her beautiful 
life.” 

“All about her invalids, I suppose. Shut-ins 
she calls them! Invalids are her mania; she had 
thirty-five on her list at her last writing; she finds 
them north, south, east, and west.” 

“Dine loves to hear about them; Miss Towne 
gives her some of their letters to read to Aunt 
Theresa. Dine runs over every morning to hear 
about last night’s mail. I am looking forward to 


312 TESSA WADSWORTH^ S DISCIPLINE. 


my good times with her if she will be as good to 
me as she is to my little sister.” 

“ She is looking forward to you; your sister’s en- 
thusiasm never flags when she may talk of you.” 

The talk drifted into books ; Mr. Hammerton 
drew nearer, his questions and apt replies added 
zest to the conversation; Tessa mentally decided 
that he was more original than the Professor ; the 
Professor’s questions were good, but no one in all 
her world could reply like Gus Hammerton; she 
was proud of him to-night with a feeling of owner- 
ship ; in loving Dine, had he not become as near as 
a brother to her? 

This feeling of ownership was decidedly pleas- 
ant; with it came a safe, warm feeling that she 
was taken care of; that she had a right to be taken 
care of and to be proud of him. No one in the 
world, the most keen-eyed student of human na- 
ture, could ever have guessed that he was suffer- 
ing from a heartache ; he had greeted her with the 
self-possession of ten years ago, had inquired about 
the “ folks at home,” and asked if Dine were up in 
the clouds still. Could Dine have made a mistake ? 
Had she dreamed it? 

Professor Towne moved away to go to Nan Ger- 
ard; Tessa listened to Mr. Hammerton, he was tell- 
ing her about a discovery in science, and half com- 
prehending and not at all replying she watched 
Professor Towne’s countenance and motions. She 
could hear about this discovery some other time, 
but she might not have another opportunity to 


SEVERAL THINGS. 


313 


study the Professor. He was her lesson to-night. 
As he talked, she decided that he did not so much 
resemble his cousin as her first glance had revealed ; 
his voice was resonant, his manner more courteous ; 
he was not at all the “ big boy,” he was dignified, 
frank, and yet reserved ; simple, at times, as his sis- 
ter might be, and cultured, far beyond any thing 
she had ever thought of in regard to Dr. Towne ; 
he was as intellectual as Gus Hammerton, as gra- 
cious as Felix Harrison, with as much heart as 
Dr. Lake, a physical presence as fascinating as Dr. 
Towne, and as pure -hearted and spiritualized as 
only himself could be. She had found her ideal at 
last. She had found him and was scrutinizing him 
as coolly and as critically as if he were one of the 
engravings in the book in her lap. She would 
never find a flaw in him; when she wrote her 
novel he should be her hero. 

“ Why, doctor ! Have the skies fallen? Did you 
hear that we were all taken with convulsions ? ” 

Nan Gerard’s laugh followed this; the doctor’s 
reply was cool and commonplace. 

“ What is the title of your book ? ” Mr. Hammer- 
ton was asking. “‘Hepsey’s Heartache?’ ‘Jennie’s 
Jumble?’ ‘Dora’s Distress?’ ‘Fannie’s Fancy?’ or it 
may be ‘Up Top or Down Below,’ ‘Smashed Hopes 
or Broken Idols.’” 

“ I will not answer you if you are not serious.” 

“I thought that young ladies gloried in senti- 
ment.” 

She turned the leaves of her book. 


314 TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 

“ Lady Blue, I can not be a just critic ; I can not 
take a sentimental standpoint; you take it natu- 
rally and truly ; you are right to do so ; it is your 
mission, your calling, your election. Do not think 
that I despise sentiment and the ideal world of 
feeling — ” 

“ You know that I do not think that,” she inter- 
rupted earnestly. 

“ These questions of feeling can not be tackled 
like a problem in mathematics, and an answer given 
in cold, clear cut, adequate words ; such a problem 
I like to tackle ; such an answer I like to give ; but 
these sentimental questions in ‘Blighted Hopes’ are 
many sided, involved, and curvilinear ; they are for 
the theologian, metaphysician, and mystic. What 
can you and I say about life’s hard questions after 
Ecclesiastes and Job ? ” 

“ Then you think I am presuming ? ” 

“ Did I not just say that sentiment is your mis- 
sion ? The story of each human life has a pathos 
of its own, and each is an enigma of which God 
only knows the solution.” i 

She colored and dropped her eyes; he did not 
dream that she knew any thing of the “ pathos ” in 
his life. How kind she would be to him ! 

“You are living your solution; perhaps you will 
help me to find mine.” 

“ I can’t imagine any one in the world knowing 
you well enough to be of any help to you.” 

“Very likely ; but I am not on a throne of rocks, in 
a robe of clouds, crowned with a diadem of snow ! ” 


SEVERAL THINGS. 


315 


“It’s a little bit warm at the foot of Mount 
Blanc,” she replied laughing. 

“ Then you shall live at the foot.” 

“ Dine and I,” she answered audaciously. 

“Not Dine! She has gone away from us; she 
would rather listen to a love-ditty from the lips of 
her new acquaintance than a volume of sober sense 
from us.” 

“ I had not thought to be jealous. She is not 
taking any thing from me.” 

“Be careful; never tell her any thing again; if 
you write to her that Mary wears a black silk to- 
night, and that Nan has geranium leaves in her 
hair, she will run and tell him. She will never 
keep another secret for you.” 

Tessa looked grave. She never would be su- 
preme in her little sister’s heart again. Perhaps 
this evening she had arrayed herself in garnet and 
gone with him to the mite society, and was laugh- 
ing and playing games, fox and geese, or ninepins, 
in somebody’s little whitewashed parlor, forgetting 
that such a place as Dunellen was down upon the 
map. 

“ Gus, we want you,” said Mary Sherwood, ap- 
proaching them. “ The girls are having a quarrel 
about who wrote something; now, go and tease 
them to your heart’s content.” 

“ Wrote what ? ” asked Tessa. 

“ Oh, I don’t know. Why are you so still ? You 
are sitting here as stately and grand and pale and 
intellectual — one must be pale to look intellectual, 


316 TESSA WADSWORTH'S DISCIPLINE. 


I suppose — as if you had written Middlemarch. I 
thought that you never went home without a sep- 
arate talk with every person in the room, and there 
you sit like a turtle in a shell. What change has 
passed over the spirit of your dream ? ” 

“ I feel quiet; I feel as if I were afraid that some 
one would push' against me if I should attempt to 
cross the room.” 

Mary was called away and she drew herself into 
her sofa corner ; the two long rooms were crowded ; 
bright colors were flashing before her eyes, the 
buzz and hum of merry talk fllled her ears; a 
black silk in contrast with a gray or blue cash- 
mere; a white necktie, a head with drooping curls, 
a low, fair forehead, a pair of square shoulders in 
broadcloth, an open mouth with flne teeth, sloping 
shoulders of gray silk, a slender waist of brown, a 
coat-sleeve with cufi* and onyx cuff-button, a small 
hand with a diamond on the first finger, and dark 
marks of needle-pricks on the tip of the same fin- 
ger, a pearl ear-ring in a red, homely ear ; — Tessa’s 
eyes saw them all, as well as the rounded chin, the 
fretful lip, the humorous lines at the corner of the 
eye, the manner that was frank and the manner 
that was intended to be, the lips that were speak- 
ing truth and the lips that were dissembling, the 
eyes that were contented and the eyes that were 
missing something— a word, perhaps, or a little at- 
tention, the eyes that brightened when some one 
approached, the eyes that dropped because some 
one was talking nonsense to some one else ; — it was 


SEVERAL THINGS. 


317 


a rest to dwell upon these things and forget that 
Dr. Lake was suffering and Sue frightened. 

The gentlemen’s faces she did not scan ; it was 
fair, matured women like Mrs. Towne and Miss 
Jewett, and sprightly, sweet girls like Nan Gerard 
that she loved. 

Dr. Towne was hedged in a corner, behind a 
chair, conversing or seeming to converse with a 
gentleman ; he was not a lady’s man, he could not 
be himself in the presence of a third or fourth 
person, that is himself, socially ; he could be him- 
self professionally under the gaze of the multitude. 
Tessa smiled, thinking how uncomfortable he must 
be and how he must wish himself at home. Was 
he longing for his leisure at Old Place, where, as a 
society man, nothing was expected of him ? Did 
he regret that he had come out “ into the world ” ? 
Was the old life in his “den” with his book a 
dream that he would fain dream again ? Perhaps 
that book that had loomed up before her as con- 
taining the wisdom of the ages was not such a 
grand affair after all ? Who had ever thought so 
beside herself? Who had ever worshipped him as 
hero and saint beside herself? He was not looking 
like either, just now, for his face was flushed with 
the heat of the room and he was standing in a 
cramped position. 

“ The bear is in his corner growling,” said Nan 
Gerard bending over her. “How ungracious he 
can be when he wills. Sometimes he is positively 
rude to me.” 


318 TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 


“ Is there but one bear ? ” 

“You know well enough whom I mean. I ex- 
pect that Mrs. Lake is mad enough because she 
couldn’t come! How prettily she makes up; I 
have seen her when she really looked elegant. 
Homely girls have a way of looking prettier than 
the pretty ones. How grave you are 1 You don’t 
like my nonsense, do you ? ” 

“ I was thinking of poor Sue.” 

“ Oh yes; sad, isn’t it? She’ll be married in less 
than two years, if he dies, see if she isn’t. I can’t 
understand what her attraction is 1 She has a thou- 
sand little airs, perhaps that is it. I am to sleep 
with you to-night. May I ? ” 

“Thank you,” said Tessa warmly, “I am very 
glad.” 

“ There, the bear is looking at us. He’ll be over 
here; now I’ll go over to the piano and see if I can 
make him follow me; I’ve had great fun doing that 
before now — you don’t do such things ; ” Nan shook 
her curls back with a pretty movement, threw a 
grave, alluring glance across the heads, and through 
the lights at the bear, then moved demurely away. 

The color touched his eyes; he looked amused 
and provoked; Tessa saw it while her eyes were 
busy with the lady in the chair near him ; would 
he follow her? Mr. Hammerton returned. 

“‘Why, William, on that old gray stone, 

Thus for the length of a half a day, 

Why, William, sit you thus alone, 

And dream the time away?’ 


SEVERAL THINGS. 


319 


Only six ladies have found their way to you in the 
last half hour ; with what sorcery do you draw them 
towards you? Tessa,” speaking in a grave tone, 
“it’s a beautiful thing for a woman to be attractive 
to women ! ” 

“ It is a very happy thing.” 

“Will you go to supper with me or do you pre- - 
fer to sit on the old gray stone ? You once liked 
to go with me to get rid of poor Harrison ; is there 
any one that you wish to rid yourself of now ? In 
these extremities I am at your service.” 

“ Are you taking me to rid yourself of a pertina- 
cious maiden ? ” 

“No, the girls do not trouble me; I wish they 
would; if Naughty Nan would only run after me, 
now — there! there goes Towne; hes after her, I 
know.” 

Tessa enjoyed the roguish, demure eyes with 
which she made room for him at her side, and 
flashed back a congratulation in return for the 
little nod of triumph which Nan telegraphed to 
her. 

“You are in league, you two; I can see that with 
my short-sighted eyes; say, you and he were prime 
friends once, weren’t you ? ” 

“We are now.” 

“ Humph I as they say in books I Why don’t you 
bring him with your eyes, then ? ” 

“ What for ? ” she asked innocently. 

“Oh, because he has money; he is a moral and 
respectable young man, also.” 


320 TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 


“You are something of a phrenologist; tell me 
what he is.” 

“I will not. You will be thinking about him 
instead of about me.” 

“I will be thinking of your deep knowledge 
of human nature, of your unrivalled penetration. 
Don’t you know that a woman likes to hear one 
man talk about another ? ” 

“ But you would not take my opinion, neverthe- 
less.” 

“True; I prefer my own unless yours confirm 
mine. Tell me, please, what is he 1 ” 

“ I have never given him five minutes’ thought.” 

“You know his face; look away from him and 
think.” 

“He isn’t a genius; but he has brains,” replied 
Mr. Hammerton slowly; “he is very quiet, as quiet 
as any man you know ; he is very gentle, his man- 
ner is perfection in a sick room — and nowhere else, 
I fancy — ” 

“ That’s too bad.” 

“ Kemember that I do not know him; I am speak- 
ing as a phrenologist ; I have never been introduced 
to him. He does not understand human nature, he 
could live a year under the roof with you or 
me, particularly you, and not feel acquainted with 
you; he is shy of women, he never knows wheth- 
er they are talking sense or nonsense ; he is not a 
lady’s man in the least, you may drop your hand- 
kerchief and stoop for it, he would never know it — ” 

“Neither would you.” 


SEVERAL THINGS. 


321 


“He can keep a secret, that he can do to per- 
fection. Tell him that you are in love with him 
and he will never, never tell ! He is no musician. 
Naughty Nan may break her wrists and the keys 
of the piano, they will not unlock his ears or his 
heart ; he is not fluent in conversation, he states a 
fact briefly, he answers a question exactly, he has 
no more to say ; but he is a good listener, he does 
not forget ; he is sympathetic, but he does not show 
it particularly, very few would think that he has 
any heart at all ; I will wager that not two people 
in the world know him, understand, or can easily 
approach him ; his temper is even, but when he is 
angry ‘ beware the fury of a patient man ! ’ He 
likes to see things orderly; he seldom raises his 
voice; he is exceedingly deliberate, and while he 
is deliberating he would do or leave undone many 
things that he would afterward regret. He will 
rush into matrimony, or he will be in love for 
years before he knows it ; his temperament is bil- 
ious. Now, Lady Blue, have I described a hero fit 
for a modern romance ? ” 

“No, only a commonplace man. All you have 
said is literally true.” 

“He is a good man,” said Mr. Hammerton, em- 
phatically. “ I mean, good as men go, in these days. 
Naughty Nan is to be congratulated. Do you not 
think so ? ” 

“ Perhaps,” said Tessa doubtfully. 

“I believe that he is planning an attack on the 
citadel under my charge; I will move ofij and give 


322 TESSA IVADSWORTH'S DISCIPLINE. 

him an opportunity; I want to talk to the Pro- 
fessor.” 

How many years ago was it since Felix had at- 
tended one of Mary Sherwood’s little parties ? Not 
more than three or four; she remembered how he 
used to hear her voice in its lightest speaking, how 
soon he became aware whenever she changed her 
position ; how many times she had raised her eyes 
to meet his with their fixed, intense gaze ; how his 
eyes would glitter and what a set look would stiff- 
en his lips. And oh, how she had teased him in 
those days by refusing his eagerly proffered atten- 
tions and accepting Gus Hammerton in the matter- 
of-fact fashion in which he had suggested himself 
as ever at her service ! In all the years she could 
remember these two, Gus, helpful and friendly, not 
in the least lover-like (she could as easily imagine 
the bell on the old Academy a lover), and Felix, 
poor Felix, — he would always be “poor Felix” now, 
— with his burning jealousy and intrusive affection. 

Was he asleep now, or awake and in pain ? Was 
he lying alone thinking of what he might have 
been but for his own undisciplined eagerness, not 
daring to look into the future nights and days, 
that would be like these, only more helpless, more 
terrible ? 

The talk and laughter ran on, her cheeks were 
hot, her head weary ; she longed for a cool pillow 
and a dark chamber; some one was speaking, she 
lifted her eyes to reply. 

“Miss Tessa, my mother misses you every hour.” 


SEVERAL THINGS. 


323 


“ I am very sorry. There is room on my sofa, will 
you sit down ? ” 

“No. I was too hasty in our last conversation,” 
bending so low that his breath touched her hair, 
“ I come to ask you to reconsider; will you?” 

“Do you want such an answer as that would 
be?” 

“That is what I do want; then you will be sure, 
so sure that you will never change — ” 

“ I am not changeable.” 

“ I think you are ; in six months I will come to 
you again, when shall it be ? ” 

“ So long ! If you care, the suspense will be very 
hard for you. I do not like to hurt you so.” 

“ I prefer the six months.” 

“Well,” speaking in her ordinary tone, “do not 
come to me, wherever I may be — we may both be 
in the next world by that time — ” 

“We shall not be so much changed as to forget, 
shall we ? ” 

“ Or not to care ? I will write you a letter on 
the first day of June; I will mail it before ten 
o’clock.” 

She laid her hand in his ; he held it a moment, 
neither speaking. 

“ Oh, you are here,” cried a voice. 

And she was talking the wildest nonsense in two 
minutes, with her eyes and cheeks aflame. 

At half past one the last guests had departed; 
Mary paused in a description of somebody’s dress 
and asked Tessa if she would like to go to bed. 


324 TESSA WADSWORTH'S DISCIPLINE. 


“I have always wished to get near to you/ 
said Nan, leading the way up-stairs. “I knew 
that there was a place in your heart for me to 
creep into.” 

Tessa had a way of falling in love with girls; 
that night she fell in love with Nan Gerard; sit- 
ting on the carpet close to the register in a white 
skirt and crimson breakfast sacque, bending forward 
with her arms clasping her knees, she told Tessa the 
story of her life. 

Tessa was seated on the bed, still in the black 
silk she had worn, with a white shawl of Shetland 
wool thrown around her; she had taken the hair- 
pins out of the hair and the long braid was brought 
forward and laid across her bosom reaching far be- 
low her waist. 

She braided and unbraided the ends of it as Nan 
talked about last winter and Dr. Towne. 

“ I like to talk to you ; I can trust you, I wouldn’t 
be afraid to tell you any thing ; I can not trust Mary, 
she exaggerates fearfully. I don’t mind telling you 
that I came near falling in love with that hand- 
some black bear; it was only skin deep however; 
I think that I have lost my attraction for him, 
whatever it was; I never do take falling in love 
hard ; why, .some girls take it as a matter of life 
and death; I think the reason must be that I can 
never love any one as I loved Kobert. He was a 
saint. Yes, he was; you needn’t look incredulous! 
I am not sentimental, I am practical and I intend 
to marry some day. People call me a flirt, per- 


SEVERAL THINGS. 


326 


haps I am, but my fun is very innocent and most 
delightful. 

“ I know this : Ealph Towne would not like me if 
I were the only girl in existence ; he wants some 
one who can think as well as talk; you wouldn’t 
guess it to hear him talk, would you ? 

“Did you ever see a man who could not talk some 
kind of nonsense? There’s Gus Hammerton, can’t 
he talk splendid nonsense ? Some of his nonsense 
is too deep for me. 

“ Now, I’ve been trying an experiment with Dr. 
Towne, he is such an old bear that I thought it 
would do no harm ; I made up my mind to see if 
it were possible for a marriageable woman to treat 
a marriageable man as if he were another woman ! 
I don’t know about it though,” she added ruefully. 

“ Has it failed ? ” 

“I think it has — rather. He does not under- 
stand — ” 

“ No man would understand.” 

“ I would understand if he would treat me as if 
I were Nathan instead of Nan; what grand, good 
friends we could be ! ” 

“ I am glad that you can see that it has failed. 
How do you detect the failure? ” 

“I have eyes. I know. His mother does not 
understand either. I think that I shall begin to 
be more — ” 

“ Maidenly ? ” 

Nan colored. “Was I unmaidenly? I have re- 
solved never to ask him to take mo anywhere again; 


326 TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 


I have made him no end of pretty things, I will do 
it no more. I would not like to have him lose his 
respect for me.” 

“It usually costs something to try an experi- 
ment; I am glad that yours has cost you no more.” 

“ So am I, heartily glad. My next shall be of a 
different nature. Did you never try an experi- 
ment ? ” 

“Not of that kind; I tried an experiment once of 
believing every thing that somebody said, and act- 
ing upon it, as if it meant what it would have 
meant to me.” 

“ And you came to grief? ” 

“ I thought so, at first. Life is a long story, isn’t 
it?” 

“ It’s an interesting one to me. I kept a journal 
about my experiment ; I’ll read it to you, shall I ? ” 

“ I would like it ever so much if you like me well 
enough to do it.” 

“ Of course I do,” springing up. “ And after I 
read it to you, you shall write the ‘final’ for 
me.” 

In the top drawer of the bureau, she fumbled 
among neckties, pocket-handkerchiefs, and a col- 
lection of odds and ends, and at last, brought out a 
small, soft-covered, thin book with edges of gilt. 

“I named it ‘Nan’s Experiment,”’ she said seri- 
ously, reseating herself near the register. “ If you 
wish to listen in comfort, draw that rocker close to 
me, and take off your boots and heat your feet. 
If you are in a comfortable position, you will be 


SEVERAL THINGS. 


327 


in a more merciful frame of mind to judge my 
misdoings.” 

Tessa obeyed, and leaned back in the cushioned 
chair, braiding and unbraiding her hair as she 
listened. 

The journal opened with an account of the jour- 
ney by train to St. Louis. The descripion of her 
escort was enthusiastic and girlish in the ex- 
treme. 

“ Is it nonsense ? ” the reader asked. 

“ Even if it were, I haven’t travelled so far away 
from those days that I can not understand.” 

She read with more confidence. 

Kalph Towne would have been pleased with the 
intentness of Tessa’s eyes and the softening of her 
lips. 

“You dear Naughty Nan,” cried Tessa, as the 
book fell from the reader’s hands. 

“ Then you do not blame me so much ? ” 

“It is only a mistake. Who does not make a 
mistake? It sounds rather more than skin-deep, 
though.” 

“ Oh, I had to throw in a little agony to make it 
interesting. I don’t want him to think — ” 

“ What he thinks is the price you pay for your 
experiment.” 

“ Now write a last sentence, and I’ll keep it for- 
ever; the names are all fictitious; no one can under- 
stand it; I’ll find a pencil.” 

Tessa held the pencil a moment. Nan on her 
knees watched her. 


328 TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 


“ Something that I shall remember all my life — 
whenever I do a foolish thing — if I ever do again.” 

“ Do you know Jean Ingelow ? ” 

“ She is the one Professor Towne reads from ? ” 

“Yes. I will write some words of hers.” 

The pencil wrote, and Nan, on her knees, read it 
word by word. 

“ I wait for the day when dear hearts shall discover, 

While dear hands are laid on my head; 

‘ The child is a woman, the book may close over. 

For all the lessons are said.’ 

“ I wait for my story — the birds can not sing it. 

Not one as he sits on the tree; 

The bells can not ring it, but long years, O bring it I 
Such as I wish it to be.” 

“Thank you, very much. You write a fine hand. 
‘Such as I wish it to be?’ No one’s story is ever 
that — do you think it ever is ? ” 

“We will do our best to make ours such as we 
wish it to be.” 

“ Professor Towne is to have a private class in 
elocution after the holidays, and Pm going to join. 
He says that I will make a reader. I wish that you 
would join too.” 

“ I wish I might, but I shall not be at home ; I 
am to spend a part of the winter away.” 

“Oh, are you? Just as I have found you. But 
you promise to write to me ? ” 

“Yes, I will write to you ; I beg of you not to 
try any experiments with me,” she added laughing. 

“ Don’t be afraid,” said Nan, seriously. 


SEVERAL THINGS. 


329 


“I wiSh you would make a friend of Miss Jewett; 
you will be glad of it as long as you live.” 

“I am doing it; but I don’t want you to go away.” 

“ I shall come back some day, childie.” 

Nan moved nearer, still on her knees, drew Tessa’s 
cheek down to her lips,— her warm, saucy, loving 
lips, — saying, “ My counsellor.” 

Dr. Greyson’s house stood opposite. Tessa went 
to the window to see if the light were still burning 
in Sue’s chamber ; Sue had forgotten to drop the cur- 
tains ; the room was well-lighted ; Sue was standing 
in the centre of the room holding something in her 
hand ; Tessa saw Dr. Greyson enter and Sue moved 
away. 

She lay in bed wide awake watching the light. 

“Good-by, Mystic; you and I will have our talk 
another day.” 

The tears dropped slowly on the pillow. 


XXL 


THROUGH. 

The snow-flakes were very large, they fell leis- 
urely, melting almost as soon as they touched Tes- 
sa’s flower bed; she was sitting at one of the sit- 
ting-room windows writing. She wrote, a&' it is 
said that all ladies do, upon her lap, her desk be* 
ing a large blank book; her inkstand stood upon 
the window-sill; the cane-seated chair in front of 
her served several purposes, one of them being a 
foot-rest; upon the chair were piled “Koget’s The- 
saurus of English Words and Phrases,” “Recrea- 
tions of a Country Parson,” a Bible, the current 
numbers of the lAvmg Age and Harpers MagaziTie, 
and George Macdonald’s latest book. 

Her wrapper was in two shades of brown, the 
ruffle at her throat was fastened by a knot of blue 
velvet ; in one brown pocket were a lead pencil, a 
letter from an editor, who had recently published 
a work upon which he had been busy twenty years 
and had thereby become so famous that the letter 
in her pocket was an event in her life, especially 
as it began: “My dear Miss Tessa, I like your let- 
ter and I like you.” 


THROUGH. 


331 


Her father was very proud of that letter. 

In the other brown pocket were a tangle of pink 
cord, a half yard of tatting, and a shuttle, and — 
what Tessa had read and reread — three full sheets 
of mercantile note from Miss Sarepta Towne. 

Dinah was seated at another window embroider- 
ing moss roses upon black velvet ; the black velvet 
looked as if it might mean a slipper for a good- 
sized foot. There was a secret in the eyes that 
were intent upon the roses; the secret that was 
hidden in many pairs of eyes — brown, blue, hazel — 
in Dunellen in these days before Christmas. 

There was not even the hint of a secret in the 
eyes that were opening “Thesaurus” and looking 
for a synonym for Information. 

“ Poor Tessa ! ” almost sighed happy Dinah, “ she 
has to plod through manuscript and books, and 
doesn’t know half how nice it is to make slippers.” 

Poor Tessa closed her book just then and looked 
out into the falling snow. 

“Perhaps we shall hear that he’s dead to-day,” 
said Dinah, brushing a white thread off the velvet. 
“I have expected to hear that every day for a 
week.” 

“But you said that he talked real bright last 
week.” 

“So Sue said. I have not seen him. He knows 
that I have called, that is enough ; I do not want 
to see him, I know that my face would distress 
him.” 

“Poor fellow,” said Dine, compassionately, “how 


332 TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 


he used to talk ! The stories that he has told in 
this room. Oh, Tessa, I can’t be thankful enough 
for every thing! To think that John should get 
such a good position in the Dunellen school 1 How 
things work around; he would not have had it but 
for Mr. Lewis Gesner! John and I are going there 
to spend the evening next week ; Miss Gesner asked 
him to bring me. And oh, Tessa, do you think that 
Gus takes it much to heart ? ” 

“If I did not know I should not think that he 
had any thing to take to heart ! ” 

“ I suppose his heart bleeds in secret,” said Di- 
nah pensively. “ Well, it isn’t my fault. You don’t 
blame me.” 

“ I never blame any one.” 

“Father and mother are very polite to John.” 
“They are never rude to any one.” 

“Say, Tessa, are you glad about me, or sorry?” 

“ Am I not always glad about you ? ” 

“ Well, about John ? ” 

“I like John; he is a good boy; but you can not 
expect me not to be disappointed about Gus I ” 

“ You think that Gus is every thing.” 

“I think that he is enough'' 

“Perhaps — perhaps — ” but Dinah became con- 
fused and dared not finish. 

Tessa felt her thought. Perhaps — but what a 
queer perhaps ; who could imagine it ? 

The sharp Faber scribbled upon waste paper for 
some minutes; it scribbled dates and initials and 
names, and then “Such as I wish it to be.” 


THROUGH. 


333 


“There goes Dr. Towne,” said Dinah. 

Tessa lifted her head in time for a bow. Then 
she scribbled, “A nightingale made a mistake.” 

The letter in her pocket had closed thus: “You 
have the faculty of impressing truth in a very 
pleasant manner ; your characters are spirited, your 
incidents savor of freshness, your style is rather 
abrupt however, it will be well to consider that.” 

A busy life, busy in the things that she loved 
best, was her ideal of happiness. 

She scribbled — “Dec. 15. Dinah making roses. 
Miss Towne wishing for me. Is any one else? 
What do I wish ? My naughty heart, be reason- 
able, be just, be sure, do not take a thing that you 
want^ just because you want it.” 

Dinah was wondering how Tessa’s face could look 
so peaceful when she was not engaged nor likely to 
be. Tessa was at peace, she was at rest concerning 
Dr. Lake. Before the storm was over, he would be 
glad that he had been born into a life upon the 
earth. In this hour — while Dine was working her 
roses and Tessa scribbling, while the snow-flakes 
were melting on Dr. Towne’s overcoat and Nan 
Gerard was studying “The Songs of Seven” to 
read to the Professor that evening — Sue and her 
husband were alone in Sue’s chamber. 

“Sue, I haven’t heard you sing to-day.” 

“How can I sing, Gerald, when you are so sick?” 

“Am I so sick? Do you know that I am?” 

“ I think I ought to know ; don’t I see how father 
looks? and didn’t Dr. Towne say that he would 


334 T£SSA IVADSWOKTH^S DISCIPLINE, 


come and stay with you to-night? Are not people 
very sick when they have a consultation?” 

“ Sometimes. What are you doing over there ? ” 

“It is time for your powder; you must sleep, 
they all say so. Will you try to go to sleep after 
you take this ? ” 

“Yes, if you will sing to me.” 

He raised himself on his elbow and took the 
spoon from her hand. “You have been a good 
wife to me, Susan.” 

“ Of course I have. Isn’t that what I promised. 
There, you spilled some; how weak your fingers 
are! you are like a baby. I don’t like babies.” 

“Don’t say that,” falling back upon the pillow. 
“I want you to be womanly, dear, and true women 
love babies.” 

“They are such a bother.” 

“ So are husbands.” 

“ When you get well, you will not be a bother I 
Can’t you talk any louder ? ” 

“ Sit down close to me. How long have I been 
sick? ” 

“Oh, I don’t know! The nights and days are 
just alike.” 

“ I expect that you are worn out. We will go to 
sleep together. I wish we could.” 

“ You mustn’t talk, you must go to sleep.” 

“Say, Susan,” catching her hand in both his, 
“are you glad you married me ? ” 

“Of course I am glad; that is, I shall be when 
you get well.” 


THROUGH. 


335 


“You wouldn’t like a feeble husband dragging 
on you all your days, would you ? ” 

“No, I wouldrit. Who would? Would you like 
a feeble wife dragging on you all your days ? ” 

“ I would like you., sick or well.” 

“ I knew you would say that. You and Tessa 
and Dr. Towne are sentimental. What do you 
think he said to me last night. ‘ Be very gentle 
and careful with him, do not even speak loud.’ ” 

“ He is very kind.” 

“As if I wouldrit be gentle ! ” 

“ Bring your chair close and sing.” 

“ I don’t feel like singing; this room is dark and 
hot, and I am sleepy.” 

“Well, never mind.” 

She pushed a chair close to the low bed and sat 
down ; he took her hand and held it between his 
flushed hot hands. “God bless you forever, and 
ever, my darling wife ! ” 

“That’s too solemn,” said Sue in an awed voice; 
“don’t say such things; I shall believe that you 
are going to die, if you do. Do go to sleep, that’s 
a good boy.” 

He laid his finger on his wrist keeping it there a 
full minute. 

“Are you stronger?” she asked eagerly. “Fa- 
ther will not say when I ask him and Dr. Towne 
only looked at me.” 

He lifted her hand to his lips and smiled. 

“Now sing.” 

“ What shall I sing ? ” 


336 TESSA WADSWORTH'S DISCIPLINE. 


“Any thing. Every thing. ‘Jesus, lover of my 
soul.’ I always liked that.” 

The clear, strong voice trembled nervously over 
the first words; she was afraid, but she did not 
know what she was afraid of; his eyelids drooped, 
he kept tight hold of her hand. 

She sang the hymn through and then asked what 
he would like next. 

“ I was almost dreaming. Sue is a pretty name, 
so is Gerald; but I would not like my boy to be 
named Gerald. Theodore means the gift of God; I 
like that ; Theodore or Theodora. If you ever name 
a child, will you remember that ? ” 

“ I shall never name a child ; I don’t like children 
well enough to fuss over them. Now, what else ? ” 

“‘Jerusalem the golden.’” 

“ Oh, you don’t want that ! It’s too solemn. I 
won’t sing it, I’U sing something livelier. Don’t 
you like ‘ Who are these in bright array ? ’ ” 

The eyelids drooped, he did not loosen his clasp, 
and she sang on ; once, when she paused, he whis- 
pered, “ Go on.” 

The snow fell softly, melting on the window-sill, 
the wood fire burnt low, she drew her hand away 
and went to the stove to put in a stick of wood; 
he did not stir, his hands were still half-clasped; 
through the half-shut lids, his eyes shone dim and 
dark. She was very weary; she laid her head 
on the white counterpane near his hands and fell 
asleep. Dr. Greyson entered, stood a moment near 
the door, and went out; Dr. Towne came to the 


THROUGH. 


337 


threshold, his eyes filled as he stood, he closed the 
door and went down-stairs; he opened the front 
parlor door, thinking of the two as they stood 
there together such a little time since, and think- 
ing of Tessa’s face as he saw it that morning. 
“ She will love him always if he leaves her now,” 
he said to himself; “when she is old, she will look 
back and grieve for him. Tessa would, but Sue — 
there’s no reckoning upon her. Why are not all 
women like Tessa and my mother?” 

He drove homeward, thinking many thoughts; 
of late, in the light of Tessa’s words, he could be- 
hold himself as she beheld him; she would have 
been satisfied, could she have known the depth of 
his selfiaccusation ; “No man but a fool could he, 
such a fool,” he had said to himself more than 
once. “There is no chance that she will take me.” 

Meanwhile Sue awoke from her heavy sleep ; it 
was growing colder, the snow was falling and not 
melting, the room was quite dark. 

“I have been asleep,” said Dr. Lake. 

“And now you are better,” cried Sue, joyfully. 
“ I knew that you were moping and had the blues.” 

Through that night and the next day. Miss Jew- 
ett watched with Sue; before another morning 
broke. Sue — poor widowed Sue! — was taken in 
hysterics from the room. 


XXIL 


SEVERAL OTHER THINGS. 

Tessa dropped the curtains, arranged the 'heavy 
crimson folds, and lighted the gas. 

“ I shall do this many times in my imagination 
before spring,” she said. “The curtains in my 
room. Dine says, are Turkey red, and my gas will 
be one tall sperm candle. Just about twilight you 
will feel my ghost stealing in, the curtains will fall, 
and invisible hands play among them, the jets will 
start into light, and then the perfume of a kiss 
will touch your forehead and hair. The perfume 
shall be that of a pansy or a day-lily, as you prefer.” 

“I would rather have your material lips; I am 
not fond of ghostly visitants; I shall feel you al- 
ways beside me; I shall not forget you even in 
my sleep.” 

“You are too kind to me,” said Tessa, after a 
moment, during which she had donned her brown 
felt hat and buttoned her long brown cloth cloak. 
The feeble old lady in the arm-chair flushed like a 
girl under the gratitude of Tessa’s eyes ; her eyes 
filled slowly as Tessa came to her and kissed her. 


SEVERAL OTHER THINGS. 


339 


“I am very old womanish about you; it must be 
because I am not strong; I would never let you go 
away out of my presence if I could hinder it.” 

“I want to stay with you; I am never happier 
than I am in this room; but I must go; it is a 
promise; and I must go to-morrow. Uncle Knox 
will meet me at the train with a creaky old buggy 
and a half-blind white horse; then we shall drive 
six miles through a flat country with farm-houses 
scattered here and there to a cunning little village 
containing one church and one store and about 
forty dwellings. Our destination is a small house 
near the end of the principal street where live the 
most devoted old couple in the world! Aunt The- 
resa and Uncle Knox are a pair of lovers; it is 
beautiful to see them together; it is worth travel- 
ling across the continent; they never forget each 
other for an instant, and yet they make no parade 
of their affection; I am sure that they will both 
die upon the same day of the same disease. Their 
life is as lovely as a poem. I have often wondered 
how they attained it, if it were perfect before they 
were married or if it greio." 

She was standing under the chandelier button- 
ing her gloves, with her earnest face towards the 
lady in the arm-chair. 

“ It gr&w^' said a voice behind her. Dr. Towne 
had entered unperceived by either. “ Is that all?” 

“Isn’t that enough?” she asked slightly flushing. 

“Yes, I think that it is enough; but I know that 
it was born and not made. It did not become per- 


340 TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 


feet in a year and a day. See if your aunt hasn’t 
had an experience that she will not tell you.” 

“And my uncle? ” she asked saucily. 

“ Men do not parade their experiences.” 

“ Providing they have any to parade,” she replied 
lightly. “ I’m afraid that I don’t believe in men’s 
experiences.” 

“Don’t say that, my dear,” said Mrs. Towne anx- 
iously. 

“ I will not,” Tessa answered, suddenly sobered, 
“not until I forget Dr. Lake.” 

“ Am I to have the mournful pleasure of taking 
you home, Miss Tessa? My carriage is at the door.” 

“I have tried to persuade her to stay all the 
evening,” said Mrs. Towne. 

“I have an engagement. My encyclopedia is 
coming to-night to talk over to me something that 
I have been writing.” 

“ Is he your critic ? ” inquired Dr. Towne. 

“Yes, and an excellent one, too. Don’t you 
know that he knows every thing ? ” 

“ Then perhaps he can tell me something that I 
want to know. Would it be safe to ask him ? ” 

“If it is to be found in a book he can tell you,” 
said Tessa seriously. 

“ It is not to be found in any poem that was ever 
written or in any song that was ever sung.” 

“ Then it remains to be written ? ” 

“ Yes; don’t you want to write it ? ” 

“I must learn it by heart first; I can not write 
what I have not learned.” 


SEVERAL OTHER THINGS. 


341 


“ Kalpli, you shall not tease her/’ interrupted his 
mother, “ she shall not do any thing that she does 
not please.” 

“Not even go into the country for three months 
in winter,” he said. 

“ What will Sue do without you, Tessa ? ” asked 
Mrs. Towne. 

“I have been with her five days; she cried and 
clung to me. I do not want to leave her, there are 
so many reasons for me to stay and so few for me 
to go. Miss Gesner came this afternoon and prom- 
ised to stay all night with her. She is a little 
afraid of Miss Gesner; with Miss Jewett and me, 
she cried and talked about him continually; the 
poor girl is overwhelmed.” 

“She will be overwhelmed again by and by,” 
said Dr. Towne. 

“Kalph! I never heard you say any thing so 
harsh of any one before.” 

“ Is truth harsh ? ” he asked. 

“If it be mild to-morrow, I will go to Sue; I will 
take her down to Old Place for a month ; she always 
throve there.” 

“ She will be dancing and singing in a month,” 
returned Dr. Towne. 

“Well, let her!” 

“But you must not be troubled, mother. I shall 
make her promise not to talk to you and go into 
hysterics.” 

“ My son, she is a widow.” 

“ ‘ And desolate,’ ” he quoted. 


342 TESSA WADSWORTH'S DISCIPLINE, 


“Tessa, will you write to me every week, child?” 

“ Every week,” promised Tessa, as she was drawn 
into the motherly arms and kissed again and again. 

Her own mother would not kiss her like that. 
Was it her mother’s fault or her own? 

As soon as they were seated in the carriage 
and the robe tucked in around her, her companion 
asked, “Shall we drive around the square? The 
sun is hardly set and the air is as warm as autumn.” 

“Yes,” she answered almost under her breath. 
In a moment she spoke hurriedly, “Does your 
mother think — does she know — ” 

“ She is a woman,” he answered abruptly. 

“I wish — oh, I wish — ” she hesitated, then added 
— “ that she would not love me so much.” 

“ It is queer,” he said gravely. 

They drove in silence through the town and 
turned into the “mountain road”; after half a 
mile, they were in the country with their faces 
towards the glimmer of light that the sunset had 
left. 

“ Miss Tessa, my mother believes in me.” 

“ I know that.” 

“ You do not weigh my words sufficiently. They 
do not mean enough to you.” 

“ Is that so very strange ? ” 

“Yes, it is strange when I tell you that I know 
I was a fool! When I tell you that I have re- 
pented in dust and ashes. I did not understand 
you, nor myself, a year ago — I am dull about un- 
derstanding people. I think that I am not quick 


SEVERAL OTHER THINGS. 


343 


about any thing ; I can not make a quick reply ; I 
have labored at my studies ; I was not brilliant in 
school or college; I am very slow, but I am very 
sure. If you had been as slow as I, our friendship 
would never have had its break; you were too 
quick for me ; but you understood me long before 
I understood myself; I did not understand myself 
until I was withdrawn from you. Do you believe 

that?” 

“Yes, I believe it. But you should have waited 
until you did understand.” 

“ It is rather tough work for a man to confess 
himself a fool.” 

Tessa said nothing. 

“I do not ask to be excused, I ask to be for- 
given ; to be borne with. Will you be patient with 
me ? ” 

“I do not know how to be patient. I am too 
quick. I have been very bitter and unjust towards 
you ; I judged you as if you were as quick as I am ; 
I have even wished you dead ; it does not do for us 
to be in a class together.” 

“Not in the short run; we haven’t tried the long 
run yet, and you are afraid to do that ? ” 

“I suppose I am. I am afraid of something; I 
think that I am afraid of myself.” 

“ If you are not afraid of me, I do not care what 
you are afraid of.” 

“ I am not afraid of you — now.” 

“Then if you do — reject me, it is because you are 
not satisfied with your heart toward me ? ” 


344 TESSA WADSWORTH' S DISCIPLINE. 


“Yes, that will be the reason,” she said slowly. 

“ And none other ? ” 

“There is no reason in yourself; now that you 
have seen how you were wrong ; the reason will all 
be in myself.” 

“ Are you coming any nearer to an understand- 
ing with yourself? ” he asked quietly. 

He had spoken in this same tone to a patient, a 
little child, not two hours since. 

The tone touched her more deeply than the words. 

“ I do not know. I am trying not to reason. I 
have worn myself out with reasoning. You are 
very still, but I know that this time is terrible to 
you ; as terrible as last year was to me ! Believe 
me, I am not lightly keeping you in suspense. 
Truly I can not decide. There is some hindrance ; 
1 do not know what it is.” 

“ I do not wish to hurry you ; you shall have a 
year to decide if you prefer. It is very sudden to 
you; you need time and quiet to recover from the 
shock; you are very much shaken. You are not as 
strong as you were two years ago. The strain has 
been too great for you ; when you have decided once 
for all time and all eternity, your eyes will look as 
they looked two years ago. All I ask you is be sure 
of ycmrsdf! I promise not to trouble you for a year ; 
I am sorry to be troubling you now. Are you very 
unhappy ? ” 

She was trembling and almost crying. 

“You shall not answer me, or think of answer- 
ing me until you are ready; I deserve to suffer; I 


SEVERAL OTHER THINGS. 


345 


do not fear the issue of your self-analysis ; when you 
have recovered from the shock and can fed that you 
have forgiven me, then you will know whether you 
love me, whether you trust me. Will you write 
to me?” 

“No, sir.” 

He laughed in spite of his vexation ; she resented 
the laugh ; he was altogether too sure of his power. 

“You must not be so sure,” she began. 

“ I shall be just as sure as — you please.” 

“You think that I am very perplexing.” 

“You are full of freaks and whims; you are a 
Mystic. Dr. Lake truly named you. I used to 
think you a bundle of impulses, and now I find you 
sternly adhering to a principle.. If your whim be 
founded on principle, and I verily believe it is, I 
honor you even when I am laughing at you.” 

“ Don’t laugh at me ; I am too miserable to bear 
that. Be patient with me as if I were ill.” 

“You are not strong enough to go from home. 
If you do not feel well, will you write for me to 
come and bring you home ? ” 

“ I am well enough.” 

“ Promise me, please.” 

“ I can not promise,” she answered decidedly. 

They were neither of them in a mood for further 
talk ; she felt more at rest than she had felt for two 
years ; there was nothing to think of, nothing to be 
hurried about ; she had a whole year to be happy 
in, and then — she would be happy then, too. As 
for him— she could not see his face, for they had 


346 T£SSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 


turned into the cross-road, thickly wooded, that 
opened into the clearing before the gates of Old 
Place. 

He spoke to his horse in his usual tone, “ Gen- 
tly, Charlie.” He stooped to wrap the robe more 
closely about her feet; as he raised himself, she 
slipped her ungloved hand into his. “Don’t be 
troubled about me, I will not be troubled; I will 
not reason; but don’t be sure; perhaps when the 
year is over I shall not be satisfied.” 

“ Then you must take another year.” 

“You will not be so patient with me another 
year; I shall not take another year.” 

“ Tessa, you are a goose ; but you are a darling, 
nevertheless.” 

“You do not understand me,” she said, with- 
drawing her hand. 

“I am too humble to expect ever to do that. 
You have never seen our home. Is it too late to 
go over the place to-night?” 

“I will go with your mother some time; she has 
described every room to me.” 

“Who is that fellow that you were engaged to?” 

“ He is not a fellow.” 

“ Who is he ? ” 

“Felix Harrison.” 

“ Ah I ” Then after a pause, “ Tell me the whole 
story.” 

The whole story was not long; she began with his 
school-boy love, speaking in short sentences, words 
and tone becoming more intense as she went on. 


SEVERAL OTHER THINGS. 


347 


“I did not mean to be so wrong; but I was so 
unhappy and he cared — ” 

“ What shall I do without you all winter ? ” 

“What have you done without me every win- 
ter ? ” she asked merrily. 

With an effort she drew herself away from the 
arm that would have encircled her. Morbidly fear- 
ful of making another mistake, she would not an- 
swer his words or his tone. 

“The witches get into me at night,” she said, 
soberly, “and I say things that I may regret in 
the sunlight.” 

“It is not like you to regret speaking truth. 
Kemember, I do not exact any promise from you; 
but if the time ever come that you know you love 
me, I want you to tell me so.” 

“ I will.” 

He drove up under the maple trees, before the 
low iron fence, as he had done on the last night 
of the old year ; another old year was almost ended ; 
they stood holding each other’s hand, neither car- 
ing to speak. 

Ralph Towne would not have been himself, if he 
had not bent and kissed her lips; and she would 
not have been herself, had she not received it 
gravely and gladly. After that it was not easy 
to go in among the talkers and the lights; she 
stood longer than a moment on the piazza, school- 
ing herself to bear scrutiny, to answer with uncon- 
cern; still she felt dizzy and answered the first 
questions rather at random. 


348 TESSA WADSWORTH^S DISCIPLINE. 


“ Going around in the dark has set your wits to 
wool-gathering,” said her mother. 

“We waited tea,” said Dinah. 

“You did not come alone, daughter?” asked her 
father. 

“No, sir. Dr. Towne brought me.” 

“We are very hungry,” said Mr. Hammerton. 

“We will talk over the book before chess, Gus, 
if you please. I have some packing to do, and I 
am very tired.” 

“ How is Sue ? ” inquired her mother. 

“Very well.” 

“ Is she taking it hard ? ” 

“ Perhaps. I do not know what hard is.” 

“Is her mourning all ready?” 

“Yes’m.” 

“ A young widow is a beautiful sight,” observed 
Mrs. Wadsworth pathetically. 

“Probably some one will think so,” said Mr. 
Hammerton, speaking quickly to save Tessa from 
replying. 

“Take off your things, Tessa,” said Dinah. “I 
want my supper.” 

“It’s his night, isn’t it?” asked Mr. Hammerton, 
teasingly; Dinah colored, looked confused, and ran 
down-stairs to ring the tea-bell. 

The door-bell clanged sharply through the house 
as they were rising from the table. “ I was young 
myself once,” remarked Mr. Hammerton. 

“ I don’t believe it,” retorted Dinah, putting her 
hands instinctively up to her hair. 


SEVERAL OTHER THINGS. 


349 


“You’ll do, run along,” laughed her father. 
“Oh, how old I feel to see my little girls becom- 
ing women.” 

“I should think Tessa would feel old,” replied 
Mrs. Wadsworth, significantly. 

“ I do,” said Tessa, rising. “ Where is your crit- 
icism, Mr. Critic; I have some packing to do to- 
night, so you may cut me to pieces before chess.” 

“No matter about chess,” said Mr. Wadsworth. 

“ Yes, it is ; I will not be selfish.” 

“ Then run up and talk over your bookish talk, 
mother and I will come up presently.” 

The sitting-room was cozy and homelike, even 
after the luxury of Mrs. Towne’s handsome apart- 
ment. “ I don’t want to go away,” sighed Tessa, . 
dropping into a chair near the round black-and- 
green covered table. “Why can’t people stay at 
home always ? ” 

“Why indeed?” Mr. Hammerton moved a chair 
to her side and seating himself carelessly threw an 
arm over the back of her chair. 

How many evenings they had read and studied 
in this fashion, with Dine on a low stool, her curly 
head in her sister’s lap. 

“They will never come again.” 

“What?” asked Tessa opening the long, yellow 
envelope he had taken from his pocket. 

“The old days when you and Dine and I will not 
want any one else.” 

“True; Dine has left us already.” 

“But you and I are content without her!” 


350 TESSA WADSWORTH\S DISCIPLINE. 

“ Are we ? I am not sure ! Gus your penman- 
ship is perfect; when I am rich, you shall copy my 
books.” 

“ How rich ? ” 

“Oh, rich enough to give you all you would ask,” 
she answered thoughtlessly. “I expect that I shall 
have to undergo a process as trying as vivisection ; 
but I will not flinch ; it is good for me.” 

“ Don’t read it now ; save it for the solitude of 
the country.” 

“No, I am anxious to see it; you can be setting 
up the chess-men ; I don’t want to take you away 
from father.” 

With the color rising in his cheeks, he arose and 
moved the chess-board nearer ; standing before her, 
he began slowly to arrange the pieces. The three 
large sheets were closely written ; she read slowly, 
once breaking into a laugh and then knitting her 
brows and drawing her lips together. 

“ Are you not pleased ? Am I not just ? ” 

“A critic is not a fault-finder, necessarily; you 
are very plain. I will consider each sentence by 
itself in my solitude; you are a great help to me, 
Gus. I thank you very much. You have been a 
help to me all my life.” 

“ I have tried to be,” he answered, taking up a 
castle and turning it in his fingers. 

“ I will rewrite my book, remembering all your 
suggestions.” 

“You remember that Tennyson rewrote “Dora” 
four hundred and forty-five times, that Victor Hugo 


SEVERAL OTHER THINGS. 


351 


declared that his six hundredth copy of “Thana- 
topsis” was his best, and that George Saijd was 
heard to say with tears in her eyes that she wished 
she had rewritten “Adam Bede” just once more; 
and you have read that Tom Brown Hughes — ” 

“ Go away with your nonsense ! I told Dr. Towne 
that you were my critic and that you knew every 
thing.” 

“ Do you tell him every thing ? ” he asked, let- 
ting the castle fall upon the carpet. 

“That isn’t every thing.” 

“ Will you play a game with me ? ” 

“ No, thank you. I am too tired for any thing 
so tiresome.” 

“You are ungrateful. Did I not teach you to 
play?” 

“You did not teach me to play when I am tired.” 

“ You have promised to write to me, haven’t 
you?” he asked. 

“No, I haven’t! If you only knew how many 
I have promised; and Aunt Theresa has a basket 
quilt cut out for me to make, sixty-four blocks! 
How can you have the heart to suggest any thing 
beside ? ” 

“ How many persons have you refused to write 
to?” 

“ I just refused one.” 

“Am I the only one you have refused?” 

“ Oh, no,” slipping the folded sheets into the en- 
velope, “ there is Mr. Gesner and Dr. Greyson and 
Professor Towne and — ” 


352 TESSA IVADSWORTH^S DISCIPLINE, 


“ Dr. Towne ? ” His uneasy fingers scattered 
several pawns over the black-and-green covering. 

“Yes, and Dr. Towne ! And he was very good 
about it, he only laughed.” 

“ Lady Blue, speak the truth.” 

“About whom?” 

“The latter. I am not concerned about the 
others.” 

“I told you the truth and you do not believe 
me. Don’t you know that the truth is always fun- 
nier than a fabrication ? ” 

“If you ask me, perhaps I will come down and 
stay over a Sunday with you.” 

“Will you? Oh, I wish you would! I expect 
to be homesick. Uncle Knox will be delighted to 
have you to talk to.” 

“I do not think that I shall travel fifty miles on 
a cold night to talk to Hm.” 

“Then I am sure that you will not to talk to 
me.” 

“ You do not know what I would do for you.” 

“Yes, I do. Any thing short of martyrdom. 
Don’t you want to go in and see John Wood- 
stock? He is a pretty boy. There come father 
and mother. You will excuse me if I do not make 
my appearance again to-night; you know I have 
been with Sue and I am so tired.” 

“ And you will not write to me ? ” 

“ What for? You may read Dine’s letters.” 

“Tell me true, Tessa,” he answered catching both 
her hands, “d^c2 you refuse to write to Dr. Towne?” 


SEVERAL OTHER THINGS. 


353 


“Yes, I did.” 

“ Why, may I ask ? ” 

“ For the same reason that I refuse to write to 
you — no, that is not quite true — ” she added, “but 
it is because I don’t want to write to either of you.” 

“ Have all these years given me the right to ask 
you a question ? ” 

He still held both hands. 

She answered seriously, “Yes. You are all the 
big brother I have.” 

“Then I will not ask it,” dropping her hands 
and turning away. ^ 

“ Say good-by, then.” 

“Good-by.” 

“I have not said any thing to displease you, 
have I?” 

“You will not write to me ? ” 

“No, I can’t. I would if I could. I will tell 
you — then you will understand and not care — 
somebody — 

“What right has somebody — ” 

Mrs. Wadsworth entered laughing, Mr. Wads- 
worth was close behind. 

“Excuse me, sir; I can’t stay to play to-night. 
Good night. Lady Blue. A pleasant visit and safe 
return.” 

An hour later Tessa was kneeling on the carpet 
before her open trunk squeezing a roll of pencilled 
manuscript into a corner. 

A tap at the door was followed by a voice, 
“Daughter, may I come in?” 

23 


364 TESSA WADSWORTH^S DISCIPLINE. 


“ If you will not mind the confusion.” 

He closed the door and seated himself on a chair 
near the end of the trunk. 

“ There is a confusion somewhere that I cfc 
mind,” he began nervously. 

She looked up in surprise. “ Why, father, is 
there something that you don’t like? Don’t you 
like it about Dine ? ” 

“ Daughter, if you are so blind that you will not 
see, I must tell you. I like it well enough about 
Dine, but I do not like it about you ? ” 

Was it about Dr. Towne? How could he object 
to him ? For he could not be aware of her objection. 

“ I am afraid that you are teasing Gus rather too 
much.” 

“Teasing Gus ! . I never really teased him in my 
life. We have never quarrelled even once.” 

“ I thought that women were quick about such 
things, but you are as blind as a bat.” 

“Such things?” She was making room for a 
glove box, a pretty one of Eussia leather that Gus 
had given her. “ He never cares for what I say ! ” 

“ How do you know that ? ” 

“How do I know?” she repeated in perplexity, 
making space in a corner while she considered her 
reply. “ Don’t you know why he can not be teased 
by what I say and do ? ” 

“ I know this — he has asked me if he may mar- 
ry you some day.” 

“i!fe/ You mean Dine. You can’t mean me. I 
know it is Dine.” 


SEVERAL OTHER THINGS. 


365 


“Oh, child,” laughing heartily, “why should I 
mean Dine ? Why should it not be you ? ” 

“ It must be Dine,” she said positively. “ Didn’t 
he say Dine ? ” 

“Am I in my dotage ? ” 

“ Couldn’t you misunderstand ? ” 

“No, I could not. What is the matter with you, 
to-night? You act as if you were bewildered.” 

“ So I am.” 

“ One evening, on the piazza, was it in May or 
June? I was not well and I said so to him; and 
he answered by telling me that he had always 
thought of you, that he had grown up hoping to 
marry you. Dine ! iVm I blind ? Have I been 
blind these ten years ? ” 

“ Didn’t he say any thing about Dine ? ” 

“We spoke of her, of course. I would not tell 
you, but I see how you are playing with him ; he 
will not intrude himself 0, Tessa, for a bright girl, 
you are very stupid.” 

“ I am not bright; I am stupid.” 

“This sisterly love is all very well, but a man 
can not bear to have it carried too far. He is pure 
gold, daughter; he is worthy of a princess. Now 
don’t worry ; you haven’t done any harm. Go to 
bed and go to sleep ; you have had too much worry 
this last week.” 

“ I know it must be Dine.” 

“If you did not look half sick, I would be 
angry with you. I thought women were quick 
witted.” 


35G TESSA WADSWORTH^S DISCIPLINE. 


“I suppose some are,” she said slowly. “He will 
never ask me, never.” 

“ Why not ? ” he asked sharply. 

“ Because — because — ” 

“ Because you haven’t thought of it. If you do 
not like any one — and I don’t see how you can — 
you don’t, do you ? ” 

“ I don’t — know.” 

“There! There, dear, don’t cry! Go to sleep 
and forget it.” 

“ I thought it was Dine. I have always thought 
that it was Dine.” 

“Well, good night. Don’t throw away the best 
man in the world. I have known him ever since 
he wore dresses, and he is worthy — even of you. 
Put out your light and go to sleep. Don’t give 
him a heartache.” 

“ Oh, I won’t, 1 won’t — if I can help it ! ” 

“Don’t have any whims. There, child, don’t cry! 
Kiss me and go to sleep.” 

She did not cry ; she was stunned and bewildered ; 
it was too dreadful to be true ; even if she did love 
Kalph Towne she would not love him if it would 
make unhappy this friend and helper of all her life ! 
This new friend should not come between them to 
make him miserable. Even if the old dream about 
Kalph Towne coM come true, she would not accept 
his love at the cost of Gus Hammerton’s happiness. 
Was he not her right arm? Was he not her right 
eye ? She had never missed him because he had 
always lived in her life ; he was as much a part of 


SEVERAL OTHER THINGS. 


357 


her home as her father and Dine; she would give 
up any thing rather than hurt him. Had she not 
suffered with him when she thought that he was 
unhappy about Dine ? She had loved him so much 
that she had never thought of loving him ; she had 
been so proud that he had loved Dine. Was it his 
influence that had kept her from loving Felix Har- 
rison ? Was he the hindrance that was coming 
between her and Dr. Towne? Was she troubled 
because she could not honor and trust Dr. Towne 
as she had unconsciously honored and trusted this 
old, old friend ? If the illusion about Kalph Towne 
had never been dispelled, she would not have dis- 
covered that Gus Hammer ton was “pure gold” as 
her father had said. They were both miserable to- 
night because of her — and she had permitted one 
of them to kiss her. Kalph Towne had left her 
once to flght out her battle alone — he had not 
been the shadow of a rock in her weaiy land — 
she could think of this now away from the fascina- 
tion of his presence; but, present or absent, there 
was no doubt, no reasoning about the old friend; 
he had been tried, he was steadfast and true. True, 
she had forgiven Ralph Towne ; but her forgiveness 
had not wrought any change in him. He was the 
Kalph Towne of a year ago, with this difference 
that now he loved her. Had his love for her 
wrought any change in him? Was he not him- 
self? Would he not always be himself.? Was she 
satisfied with him if she could feel the need of 
change ? 


358 TESSA WADSWORTH'S DISCIPLINE. 


A year ago would she have reasoned thus? 
Where love is, is there need of reasoning to prove 
its existence, its depth or its power of continuance ? 
She knew that she loved God; she knew that she 
loved her father. If she loved Kalph Towne, why 
did she not know that, also ? 

Why must she reason? Why might she not 
Tcnoio? She did not know that she loved him. Did 
she know that she did not love him? Wearied even 
to exhaustion, her head drooped until it touched the 
soft pile in the open trunk ; there were no tears, not 
a sound moved her lips; she was very glad that she 
was going away. 

If she might tell Gus, would he not talk it over 
to her and make it plain? It would not be the 
first matter in which he had taught her to discern 
between the wrong and the right. Was there a 
wrong and a right in this choosing ? 

The large tears gathered and fell. 

Ealph Towne could not help her; he would say 
caressingly, “Love me, and end the matter.” In 
her extremity he was not a helper. Would he ever 
be in any extremity of hers? 

The tears fell for very weariness and bewilder- 
ment. What beside was there to shed tears about? 
She was so weary that she had forgotten. 

A laugh in the hall below; the sound of a scuf- 
fle, another laugh, and the closing of the street 
door. 

Those two children ! 

Dinah burst into the room, still laughing. “ Why, 


SEVERAL OTHER THINGS. 


359 


Tessa! All through! You look as if you wanted 
to pack yourself up, too,” she cried in a breezy voice. 
“The candle is almost burnt dow».” 

“No matter. Don’t get another.” 

“ Your voice sounds as if you were sick. Mother 
has been expecting you to be too sick to go.” 

“ I shall not be sick,” rising, and dropping the 
lid of her trunk. “Tell me about the night you 
overheard Gus talking to father on the piazza.” 

“ I did tell you, didn’t I ? He did not mind be- 
cause John came to-night; didn’t you hear him 
tease me ? About that night ? Oh, I was asleep, 
and they were on the piazza; of course I don’t 
know how long they had been talking, nor what 
suggested it, but I heard him say, — really I’ve for- 
gotten just what, it was so long ago, — but father 
said that he was so glad and happy about it, or it 
meant that. I suppose I may have missed some 
of it. Poor old Gus said that he knew I did not 
care for any one else. Isn’t it touching? Poor 
fellow! And I didn’t then. I never should if I 
hadn’t gone away and found J ohn. Lucky for me, 
wasn’t it ? Gus never looked at me as he did at 
you to-night, anyway; I guess he’s transferring.” 

Long after midnight Tessa fell asleep; her last 
thought shaping itself thus : 

“ I can not reason myself into loving or not lov- 
ing, any more than I can reason the sun into shin- 
ing or not shining.” 

On her way to the train the next morning, she 
mailed a letter addressed — 


360 TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 


Bcdph Totvm^ M. Z>., 

City:' 

Her tender, passionate, truth-loving, bewildered 
heart had poured itself out in these words : 

“ 1 am so afraid of leading you to think some- 
thing that is not true ; something that I may have 
to contradict in the future. When I am with you, 
I forget every thing but you ; when I am alone, my 
heart rises up and warns me that I may be making 
another mistake, that I only think I love you be- 
cause I want to so much, and that I should only 
worry you with my caprices and doubts if I should 
marry you. You have been very patient with me, 
but you might lose your patience if I should try it 
too far. I miU not marry you until I am sure; I 
must know of a certainty that I love you with the 
love that hopes, endures, that can suffer long and 
still is kind. You do not know me, I am hard and 
proud; when I went down into the Valley of Humil- 
iation because of believing that you loved me when 
you did not, I was not gentle and sweet and for- 
giving — I was hard and bitter ; I hated you almost 
as much as I had loved you. Now I must think it 
all through and live through all those days, the 
days when I loved you and the days when I hated 
you, before I can understand myself I could marry 
you and we could live a lifa^ of surface peace and 
satisfaction, and you might be satisfied in me and 
with me; but if I felt the need of loving you more 


SEVERAL OTHER THINGS. 


361 


than I did love you, my life would be bondage. If 
the pride and hardness and unforgivingness may 
be taken away and I may love you and believe in 
you as I did that day that you brought me the 
English violets, I shall be as happy — no, a thou- 
sand times happier than I was then. But you must 
not hope for that ; it is not natural; it may be that 
of grace such changes are wrought, but grace is 
long in working in proud hearts. You are not 
bound to me by any word that you have spoken; 
find some one gentle and loving who will love you 
for what you are and for what you will be.” 


XXIIL 


WHAT SHE MEANT. 

In the weeks that followed, Tessa learned to the 
full the meaning of homesickness. No kindness could 
have exceeded the kindness that she hourly received 
from uncle and aunt and from the inmates of the 
cottage over the way ; still every night, or rather 
early every morning, she fell asleep with tears upon 
her cheeks ; she longed for her father, her mother, 
for Dine and Gus, for Miss Jewett, for Nan Gerard, 
and even poor, grief-stricken Sue ; for Mrs. Towne’s 
dear face and dear hands she longed inexpressibly, 
and she longed with a longing to which she would 
give no sympathy for another presence, an unob- 
trusive presence that would not push its way, a 
presence with the aroma of humility, gentleness, 
and a shy love that persisted with a persistence 
that neither the darkness of night nor the light of 
day could dispel. 

Lying alone in the darkness in the strange, low 
room, with a fading glow upon the hearth that 
lent an air of unreality to the old-fashioned furni- 
ture, she congratulated herself upon having been 


WHAT SHE MEANT. 


3G3 


brave and true, of having withheld from her lips a 
draught for which she had so long and so despair- 
ingly thirsted; she had been so brave and true that 
she must needs be strong, wherefore then was she 
so weak ? Sometimes for hours she would lie in per- 
fect quiet thinking of Mr. Hammerton ; but think- 
ing of him as calmly as she thought about her fa- 
ther. There was no intensity in her love for him, no 
thrill, save that of gratitude for his years of broth- 
erly watchfulness; she would have been proud of 
him had he married Dine ; his friendship was a dis- 
tinction that she had worn for years as her rarest 
ornament; he was her intellect, as her father was 
her conscience, but to give up all the others for 
him, to love him above father, mother, sister — to 
give up forever the hope of loving Ralph Towne 
some day — she shuddered and covered her face 
with her hands there alone in the dark. Cheery 
enough she was through the days, sewing for Aunt 
Theresa and falling into her happiest talk of books 
and people, thoughts and things, reading aloud to 
Uncle Knox, and every evening reading aloud the 
pages of manuscript that she had written that day, 
and every afternoon, laying aside work or writing, 
to run across to the cottage for a couple of hours 
with Miss Sarepta. 

Miss Sarepta at her window in her wheel-chair 
watched all day the black, brown, or blue figure at 
her writing or sewing, and when the hour came, 
saw the pencils dropped into the box, the leaves 
of manuscript gathered, the figure rise and toss 


364 TESSA WADSWORTH^ S DISCIPLINE. 


out its arms with a weary motion ; then, in a few 
moments the figure with a bright shawl over its 
head would run down the path, stand a moment 
at the gate to look up and down and all around, 
and then, with the air of a child out of school, run 
across the street and sometimes around the gar- 
den before she brought her bright face into the 
watcher’s cosy, little world. 

Miss Sarepta’s mother described Tessa as “bright, 
wide awake, and ready for the next thing.” 

Miss Sarepta told Tessa that while knowing that 
good things were laid up for her, she had no thought 
that such a good thing as Tessa Wadsworth was 
laid up for this winter’s enjoyment and employ- 
ment. 

It may be that the strain of the day’s living 
added to the feverishness of the night’s yearn- 
ings ; for when darkness fell and the wind sounded 
in the sitting-room chimney, her heart sank, her 
hands grew cold, her throat ached with repressed 
tears, and when she could no longer bear it, the 
daily paper having been read aloud and a letter or 
two written, she would take her candle and bid the 
old people as cheery a good night as her lips could 
utter and hasten up-stairs to her fire on the hearth 
to reperuse her letters and to dream waking dreams 
of what might be, and when the fire burned low to 
lie awake in the darkness, till, spent in flesh and in 
spirit, she would fall asleep. 

At the beginning of the third week, she took 
herself in hand; with a figurative and merciless 


WHAT SHE MEANT. 


865 


gripe upon each shoulder she thus addressed her- 
self : “Now, Tessa Wadsworth, you and I have 
had enough of this ; we have had enough of freaks 
and whims for one lifetime; you are to behave 
and go to sleep.” 

Behaving and going to sleep took until mid- 
night with the first attempt, and she dreamed of 
Dr. Lake and awoke crying. Was Sue crying, too? 
Sue had loved her husband, his influence would 
color all her life, she might yet become her ideal 
of a woman; womanly. Sue’s hand had been in 
his life ; had not his hand with a firmer grasp tight- 
ened around her life ? 

Tessa did not forget to be metaphysical even at 
midnight with the tears of a dream on her eye- 
lashes. 

Was every one she loved asleep, or had some one 
dreamed of her and awoke to think of her ? 

“ God bless every one I love,” she murmured, 
“and every one who loves me.” 

The next night by sheer force of will she was 
asleep before the clock struck eleven, and did not 
dream of home or once awake until Hilda, the 
Swedish servant, passed her door at dawn. 

Her letters through this time were radiant, of 
course. Mrs. Towne only, with her perfect under- 
standing of Tessa, detected the homesickness, or 
heartsickness. Tessa was wading in deep waters; 
she did not need her, else she would have come to 
her. She had learned that it was her characteris- 
tic to fight out her battles alone. 


366 TESSA WADSWORTH'S DISCIPLINE. 


Had Kalph any thing to do with this ? He had 
suddenly grown graver, not more silent; in the 
morning his eyes would have a sleepless look, the 
sunshine seemed utterly gone from them; once he 
said, apropos of nothing, after a long fit of ab- 
straction: “ It is right for a man to pay for being a 
fool and a knave, but it comes terribly hard.” 

“ I suppose it must,” she had replied, “ until he 
learns how God forgives.” 

In her next letter to Tessa, Mrs. Towne had writ- 
ten, “Do you know how God forgives ? ” and Tessa 
had replied, “You and I seem to be thinking the 
same thought nowadays, and nowanights, for last 
night it came to me that loving enough to forgive 
is the love that makes Him so happy.” 

This letter was the only one of all written that 
winter that Mrs. Towne showed to her son. It was 
not returned to her. Months afterward he showed 
it to Tessa, saying that that thought was more to * 
him than all the sermons to which he had ever lis- 
tened. “ Because you didn’t know how to listen,” 
she answered saucily, adding in a reverent tone, “I 
did not understand it until I lived it.” 

The letter had been written with burning cheeks ; 
if he might read it, she would be glad ; it would re- 
veal something that she did not dare tell him her- 
self; but she had no hope that he would see it. 

“Tessa is not so bright as she was,” observed 
Miss Sarepta’s mother, “she’s more settled down; 

I guess that she has found out what she means ; it 
takes a deal of time for young women to do that.” 


XXIV. 


SHUT IN. 

It was a trial to Sarepta Towne that the sun did 
not rise and set in the west, for in that case her 
bay window would have been perfect. 

Dinah had named this window “summer time:” 
on each side ivy was climbing in profusion ; on the 
right side stood a fuchsia six feet in height; oppo- 
site this an oleander was bursting into bloom; a 
rose geranium and a pot of sweet clover were 
placed on brackets and were Tessa’s special favor- 
ites ; one hanging basket from which trailed Wan- 
dering J ew was filled with oxalis in bloom, another 
was but a mass of graceful and shining greens. 

In the centre of the window on a low table stood 
a Ward’s case ; into this Dinah had never grown tired 
of looking; Professor Towne had constructed it on 
his last visit at home, and one of the pleasures 
of it to Miss Sarepta had consisted in the talks 
they had while planning it together. Among its 
ferns, mosses, berries, and trailing arbutus they had 
formed a grotto of shells and bits of rocks; the floor' 
was bits of looking-glass ; tufts of eye-bright were 
mingled with the mosses and were now in bloom, 


368 TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 


and Miss Sarepta was sure that the trailing arbutus 
would flower before Tessa could bring it home to 
her from the woods. 

“This room is full of Philip and Cousin Ralph,” 
Sarepta had said; “his picture is but one of the 
things in it and in this house to remind me of 
Cousin Ralph.” 

“ Sarepta breathes Philip,” her mother replied. 

“We are twin spirits like Blaise and Jacqueline 
Pascal. Do you know about them, Tessa ? 

“ I know that he was a monk and she a nun.” 

“ That is like me, and not like Philip,” said Miss 
Sarepta; “he shall not be a monk because I am 
a nun ! ” 

“His wife will be jealous enough of you, though,” 
said Mrs. Towne ; “ not a mail comes that he does not 
send you something. How would she like that?” 

“ Philip could not love any one that would come 
between us. Tessa, do you admire my brother as 
much as I wish you to do ? ” 

“ I admire him exceedingly,” said Tessa, looking 
up from her twenty-fifth block of the basket quilt ; 
“he is my ideal. I knew that I had found my ideal 
as soon as I saw him ; I did not wait to hear him 
speak.” 

And that he was her ideal she became more and 
more assured, for in February he spent a week at 
home and she had opportunity to study him at all 
hours and in any hour of the day. He had lost his 
fancied resemblance to Dr. Towne, or she had lost 
it in thinking of him as only himself The long 


SHUT IN. 


369 


talks, during which she sat, at Miss Sarepta’s side, 
on a foot cushion, work in hand, the basket blocks, 
or some more fanciful work for Miss Sarepta, she 
remembered afterward as one of the times in her 
life in which she grew. She told Miss Sarepta that 
she and her brother were like the men and women 
that St. Paul in his Epistles sent his love to. “ He 
ought to marry a saint like Madame Guy on ; I think 
that it would be easier to revere him as a saint than 
to marry him. I can’t imagine any woman forgiv- 
ing him, or loving him because he needs her love; 
he stands so far above me, I could never think of 
him as at my side and sometimes saying, ‘ Help me, 
Tessa,’ or, ‘ What do you think ? ’ ” 

“ Now we know your ideal of marriage,” laughed 
Mrs. Towne. “ Philip is a good boy, but he some- 
times needs looking after.” 

“ Stockings and shirt buttons 1 ” 

“And other things, too. He is forgetful, and 
he’s rather careless. How much he is taken up 
with that reading class ! ” 

“In a monkish way,” smiled Miss Sarepta. “He 
was full of enthusiasm about Ralph, too, mother.” 

“How is it. Miss Tessa, do you admire Dr. Towne 
as much as you do St. Philip?” inquired the old 
lady with good-humored sarcasm. 

“ He is not a saint,” said Tessa, “ he needs look- 
ing after in several matters besides stockings and 
shirt buttons.” 

“ Philip talks about him ! What is it that he 
says he is, Sarepta ? ” 


370 TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE, 


“In his profession just what he expected that 
he would be, — quick, quiet, gentle, sympathetic, 
patient, persevering; he has thrown himself into 
it heart and soul. Philip used to wonder if he 
would ever find his vocation ; his life always had 
a promise of good things — ” 

“ But he was slow about it ; not quick like Philip ; 
he should have begun practice ten years ago. What 
has he been doing all this time ? ” 

“We can see the fruit of his doing, mother; it 
does not much matter as to the doing itself. Don’t 
you know that six years are given to the perfect- 
ing even of a beetle ? ” 

“ I don’t know about beetles and things ; I know 
that I used to think that my boy would outstrip 
Lydia’s boy.” 

“ Mother ! mother ! ” laughed Sarepta, “ you mind 
earthly things. I shall never run a race with any- 
body. Can’t you be a little proud of me ? ” 

Sarepta Towne had her brother’s eyes, but her 
hair was brighter, with not one silver thread among 
its short curls ; her fair, fresh face was certainly ten 
years younger than his. In summer her wrappers 
were of white ; in winter she kept herself a bird in 
gay plumage ; always the singing-bird, in white or 
crimson. When Philip Towne said “My sister,” 
his voice and eyes said “ My saint.” 

Once, after a silence, Tessa asked about her 
“ Shut-ins.” “ How did it come into your heart 
at first ? ” 

“It is a long story; first tell me what your heart 


SHUT IN. 


371 


has been about. It has been painting your eyes 
darker and darker,” 

“It is a very foolish heart then ; it was only re- 
peating something that I learned once and did not 
then understand. I do not know that I can say it 
correctly, but it is like this : 


“ ‘ God’s generous in giving, say I, 

And the thing which he gives, I deny 
That He ever can take back again. 

He gives what He gives: be content. 

He resumes nothing given; be sure. 
God lend ? where the usurers lent 
In His temple, indignant He went 
And scourged away all those impure. 
He lends not, but gives to the end. 

As He loves to the end. If it seem 
That He draws back a gift, comprehend 
’Tis to add to it rather, amend 
And finish it up to your dream.’ ” 


“ Well ? ” said Miss Sarepta. 

“Once, — a long time ago, it seems now, — He 
gave me something; it was love for somebody; 
and then He took it — or I let it go, because it was 
too much trouble to keep it ; I did not like His gift, 
it hurt too much ; I was glad to let it go, and yet I 
missed it so ; I was not worthy such a perfect gift 
as a love that could be hurt in loving ; I could love 
as I loved all beauty and goodness and truth, but 
when I found that love must hold on and endure, 
must hope and believe, must suffer shame and loss, 
I gave it up. God was generous in giving; He 


372 TESSA WADSWORTH^S DISCIPLINE. 


gave me all I could receive, and when He would 
have given me more, I shrank away from His giv- 
ing and said, ‘ It hurts too much. I am too proud 
to take love or give love if I must be made humble 
first’ I wanted to give like a queen, not stooping 
from my full height, and I wanted to give to a 
king: instead, I was asked to give — -just like any 
common mortal to another common mortal, and 
that after we had misinterpreted and misunder- 
stood each other, and I had written hard things 
of him all over my heart, and what he had thought 
me, nobody knows but himself! And now I think, 
if I will, that I may have the love again finished 
up to my dream; finished above any thing that I 
knew how to ask or think, and it is altogether too 
good and perfect a gift for me ; so good that I can 
not keep it, I must needs give it away.” 

Tessa had told her story with quickened breath, 
not once lifting the eyes that were growing darker 
and darker. 

Miss Sarepta’s “ thank you ” held all the appreci- 
ation that Tessa wished. 

“ And now,” after another silence, for these two 
loved silences together, “ you want to know about 
my dear Shut-ins. Philip named them from the 
words, ‘ And the Lord shut him in.’ It began one 
day when I was sitting alone thinking I I am often 
sitting alone thinking ; but this day I was thinking 
sad thoughts about my useless, idle life, and I had 
planned my life to be such a busy life. There was 
nothing that I could do to help along; I had to sit 


SHUT IN. 


873 


still and be helped; and I shouldn’t wonder if I cried 
a little. That was five years ago, we were living 
in the city then ; in the middle of my bemoanings 
and my tears, I spied the postman crossing the 
street. How Philip laughed when I told him that 
I loved that postman better than any man in all 
the world ! That day he brought me several lovely 
things : one of them a book from Cousin Kalph, and 
a letter from Aunt Lydia ; that letter is the begin- 
ning of my story. She told me about a little inva- 
lid that she had found and suggested that I should 
write one of my charming letters to her. Of course 
you know that I write charming letters ! So I wiped 
away my naughty tears and wrote the charming let- 
ter ! In a few days, my hero, the postman, brought 
the reply. That was my first Shut-in letter. Bring 
me the album, I will show you Susie.” 

Tessa brought it and Miss Sarepta opened it on 
her lap to an intelligent, serious, sweet face. 

“She has not taken a step for many years; she 
is among the youngest of many children ; her great 
love is love for children, she teaches daily thirteen 
little ones. The one thing in her life that strikes 
me is her faithfulness. There is nothing too little 
for her to be faithful in. One of her great long- 
ings used to be for letters; oh, if the postman 
would only bring her a letter ! For a year or two 
I wrote every week, the longest, brightest, most 
every-day letters I could think of. And one day 
it came to me that if we had such a good time to- 
gether, why should we not find some other to 


374 TESSA WADSWORTH'S DISCIPLINE, 


whom a letter or a book would be as a breath of 
fresh air. I pondered the matter for a month or 
two, but I couldn’t advertise for an invalid, and 
none of my friends knew of any. One morning I 
glanced through a religious paper, and tossed it 
aside, then something moved me to pick it up 
again, and there she was ! The one I sought ! 
That was Elsie. Look at her pale, patient face. 
For fourteen years she has lived in one room. 
And hasn’t she the brightest, most grateful, hap- 
piest heart that ever beat in a frail body or a strong 
one? Her poems are graceful little things; I will 
show you some of them. She had been praying six 
months for a helpful friend, when she received my 
first letter. Her letters are gems. You shall read 
a pile of them. And she had a Shut-in friend, to 
whom I must write, of course. She is Mabel. I 
have no picture of her. When she was well, they 
called her the laughing girl; she has lain eleven 
years in bed ! ” 

“ Oh, dear me I ” sighed Tessa. 

“Don’t sigh, child. She writes in pencil as she 
can not lift her head. I call her my sunbeam. 
She often dates her letters ‘In my Corner.’ So an- 
other year went on with my three Shut-ins. I for- 
got to cry about my folded hands and useless life.. 
One day it came into my mind to write a sketch 
and call it, ‘ Our Shut-in Society ’ ; to write all about 
Mabel and Elsie and Sue, and send it to the paper 
in which I had found Elsie’s first article. 

“And that sketch! How it was read! I re- 


SHUT IN. 


376 


ceived letters from north, south, east, and west con- 
cerning it. Was there really such a society, and 
were there such happy people as Mabel, Elsie, and 
Susie? One who had not spoken aloud for four- 
teen years would love to write to them; another 
who had locked her school-room door one summer 
day, and come home to rest, had been forced to rest 
through eight long years, and was so lonely, with 
her sisters married and away ; another, quite an old 
man, who had lain for six years in the loft of an 
old log-cabin, was eager for a word or a paper. 
How his letter touched us all ! ‘ The others have 

letters, but when the mail comes naught comes to 
me,’ he wrote. But you will be tired of hearing 
my long story ; you shall see their letters ; you must 
see Delle’s letters ; she sits all day in a wheel-chair, 
and has no hope of ever taking a step ; she has a 
mother and a little boy ; the brightest little boy ! 
Her poems have appeared in some of our best peri- 
odicals; we are something beside a band of suf- 
ferers, Miss Tessa; some of us are literary! My 
most precious letters are from Elizabeth; her fif- 
tieth birthday came not long since; for ten years 
her home has been in one room; she has written a 
book that the Shut-ins cry over. 

“ And oh, we have a prisoner I A Shut-in shut 
up in state’s prison. A young man with an inno- 
cent, boyish face ; he ran away from home when he 
was a child and ran into state’s prison because no 
one • cared what became of him. His letters are 
unafiected and grateful ; he does want to be a good 


376 TESSA WADSWORTH^S DISCIPLINE. 


boy ! Thirty-six are on my list now ; I would find 
more if I had strength to write more; some of them 
have more and some less than 1; many of them 
have Shut-ins that I know nothing about. We 
remember each other on holidays and birthdays ! 
The things that postmen and country mail-carriers 
have in their mail-bags are funny to see: flower 
seeds, bits of fancy work, photographs, pictures, 
any thing and every thing ! 

“ They all look forward to mail-time through the 
night and through the day. 

“And, speaking humanly, my share in it, all I 
receive and the little I give, came out of my self- 
bemoanings and tears ; my longing to be a helper 
in some small way ! 

“ Now if you want to help me, you may cut some 
blocks of patch-work for me. One of the Shut-ins 
is making a quilt to leave as a memorial to her 
daughter, and I want to send my contribution 
to the mail to-night; and you may direct several 
papers for me, and cover that book, ‘ Thoughts for 
Weary Hours.’ I press you into my service, you 
see.” V 

“Miss Sarepta, I am ashamed.” 

“Shame is an evidence of something; go on.” 

“ I am ashamed that 1 am such a dreamer.” 

“ Philip says that you are a dreamer.” 

“ I care for my writing.” 

“ Mowers work while they whet their scythes,” 
quoted Miss Sarepta. 


XXV. 

BLUE MYRTLE. 

In March, Tessa found myrtle in bloom, and took 
a handful of the blue blossoms mingled with sprays 
of the green leaves to Miss Sarepta. 

“ Spring has come,” she said dropping them on 
the open book in Miss Sarepta’s lap. 

“ If spring has come, then I must lose you.” 

“ Every hand that I know in Dunellen is beckon- 
ing me homewards; my winter’s work is done.” 

That evening — it was the sixth of March, that 
date ever afterward was associated with blue myr- 
tle and Nan Gerard — she was sitting at the table 
writing letters; in the same chair and at the same 
place at the table where Dinah had written her 
letter about Gus and her wonderful John; Aunt 
Theresa was knitting this evening also, and Uncle 
Knox was asleep in a chintz-covered wooden rocker 
with the big cat asleep on his knees. 

She had written a letter to Mabel and one to 
Elsie, lively descriptive letters, making a picture of 
Miss Sarepta’s book-lined, picture-decorated, flower- 
scented room and a picture of Miss Sarepta, also, 


378 TESSA WADSWORTH^ S DISCIPLINE. 


touching lightly upon her own breezy out-of-door 
life with its hard work and its beautiful hopes. 
The third letter was a sheet to Mrs. Towne; the 
sentence in ending was one that Mrs. Towne had 
been eagerly and anxiously expecting all through 
the winter: “My ring reminds me of my promise; 
a promise that I shall keep some day, perhaps.” 

“Tessa, are you unhappy, child?” asked Aunt 
Theresa with a knitting needle between her lips. 

“Unhappy! Why, auntie, what am I doing?” 

The tall lamp with its white china shade stood 
between them. Aunt Theresa took the knitting 
needle from its place of safety and counted four- 
teen stitches before she replied. 

“ Sighing 1 When young people sigh, something 
must ail them. What do you have to be miserable 
about ? ” 

“ I am not miserable.” 

“ Tell me, what are you miserable about ? ” 

“ Sometimes — I am not satisfied — that is all.” 

“I should think that that was enough. What 
are you dissatisfied about? Haven’t you enough 
to eat and to drink and clothes enough to wear ? 
Haven’t you a good father and mother who wouldn’t 
see you want for any thing ? What is it that you 
haven’t enough of, pray ? ” 

“ I do not know that I am wishing for any thing 
— to night. 1 am learning to wait.” 

“Yes, you are I You are wishing for something 
that isn’t in this world, I know.” 

“Then I’ll find it in heaven.” 


BLUE MYRTLE. 


379 


“ People don’t sigh after heaven as a usual thing. 
You read too many books, that’s what’s the matter 
with you. Beading too many books affects differ- 
ent people in different ways ; I’ve seen a good deal 
of girls’ reading.” 

Tessa’s pen was scribbling initials on a half sheet 
of paper. 

“ I know the symptoms. Some girls when they 
read love-stories become dissatisfied with their 
looks; they look into the glass and worry over 
their freckles or their dark skins, or their big 
mouths or turn-up noses; they fuss over their 
waists and try to squeeze them slim and slender, 
and they cripple themselves squeezing their num- 
ber four feet into number two shoes. But you are 
not that kind. And some girls despise their fa- 
thers and mothers because they can’t speak gram- 
mar and pronounce long words, and because they 
say ‘ care ’ for carry and ‘ empt ’ for empty ! And 
they despise their homes and their plain, sub- 
stantial furniture. But you are not that kind 
either. Your face is well enough, and your fa- 
ther and mother are well enough, and your home 
is well enough.” 

Tessa was scribbling Dunellen, then she wrote 
K. T. and Nan Gerard. 

“And you are not sighing for a lordly lover,” 
continued Aunt Theresa, with increasing energy. 
“You don’t want him to wear a cloak or carry a 
sword. Your trouble is different ! You read a 
higher grade of love-stories, about men that are 


380 TESSA WADSWORTirS DISCIPLINE. 

honorable and true, who would die before they 
would tell a lie or say any thing that isn’t so. 
They are as gentle as zephyrs; they would walk 
over eggs and not crack them; they are always 
thinking of something new and startling and deep 
that it can’t enter a woman’s mind to conceive, and 
their faces have different expressions enough in 
one minute to wear one ordinary set of muscles 
out; and they never think of themselves, they 
would burn up and not know it, because they 
were keeping a fly off of somebody else; they are 
so high and mighty and simple and noble that an 
angel might take pattern by them. And that is 
what troubles you. You read about such fine fel- 
lows and shut the book and step out into life and 
break your heart because the real, mannish man, 
who is usually as good as human nature and all 
the grace he has got will help him be, isn’t so per- 
fect and noble as this perfect man that somebody 
has made out of his head. You can’t be satisfied 
with a real human man who thinks about himself 
and does wrong when it is too hard to do right, 
even if he comes on his bended knees and says he’s 
sorry and that he’U never do such a thing again. 
You want to love somebody that you are proud of; 
you are too proud to love somebody that is as weak 
as you are. And so you can’t be satisfied at all ! 
Why must you be satisfied ? ” 

“ Why should I not be ? ” 

“For the best reason in the world; to be satisfied 
in any man, in his love for you and in your love for 


BLUE MYRTLE. 


381 


him, would be — do you know what it would be? 
It would be idolatry.” 

Aunt Theresa’s attention was given to her knit- 
ting ; she did not see the shining of Tessa’s eyes. 

“ Be satisfied with God, child, and take all the 
happiness you can get.” 

Tessa’s pen was making tremulous capitals. 

“ Be satisfied wit\ if you can, but not m, some 
good man who stumbles to-day and stands straight 
to-morrow ; I fought it out on that line once, and so 
I know all about it.” 

This then was the experience that Dr. Towne 
had said that she must ask for; had he guessed 
that it would be altogether on his side ? 

This was it, and this was all. Uncle Knox’s old 
eyes had a look for his old wife that they never 
held for any other living thing, and as for Aunt 
Theresa, how often had Tessa thought, “ I want to 
grow old and love somebody the way you do.” 

Might she be satisfied with God and love Kalph 
Towne all she wanted to ? 

“Why, Theresa,” exclaimed Uncle Knox, open- 
ing his eyes and staring at his wife, “I haven’t 
heard you talk so much sentiment for thirty years.” 

“ And you will not in another thirty years. But 
Tessa was in a tangle — I know eggs when I see the 
shells — and I had to help her out.” 

A tap at the window brought Tessa to her feet. 
A neighbor had brought the mail; she took the 
papers and letters with a most cordial “thank you” 
and came to the table with both hands full. The 


382 TESSA WADSWORTW S DISCIPLINE. 


papers she opened and glanced through ; the letters 
she took up-stairs to read. The business-looking 
envelope she opened first; she read it once, twice, 
then gave an exclamation of delight. Oh, how 
pleased her father would be ! Her manuscript 
had given such perfect satisfaction that, although 
written for pictures, the pictures would be dis- 
carded and new ones made to illustrate her story. 
Gus would congratulate her, and Miss Jewett; this 
appreciation by the publisher was the crown that 
the winter’s work would always wear for her. With 
a long breath, she sighed, “ Oh, what a blessed win- 
ter this has been to me ! ” 

The long, white envelope was from Mrs. Towne, 
the chocolate from Sue, the cream-colored from Di- 
nah, the pale blue from Miss Jewett, the pink from 
Nan Gerard, and the square white from Laura Har- 
rison. Mr. Hammerton had not once written; a 
kind message through her father or Dinah was 
all evidence he had given of remembrance. Mrs. 
Towne’s letter was opened before the others. What 
would Dine or Miss Jewett or Laura think of this? 
The faint perfume was the lady herself, so real was 
her presence that Tessa felt her arms about her as 
she read. 

“ Sue does not come to me as often as in the win- 
ter,” she wrote; “the Gesners, one and all, are prov- 
ing themselves more alluring. Miss Gesner will 
be a good friend to her. If you could hear her 
laugh and talk, you would think of her as Sue 
Grey son and never as the widowed Mrs. Lake. 


BLUE MYRTLE, 


383 


She is Dr. Lake’s widow, certainly she is not his 
wife. Kalph growls about it in his kind way, but 
I think that he did not expect any thing deeper 
from her. Nan Gerard was with me all day yester- 
day; she was as sweet and shy as a wild flower. 
Nan’s heart is awake. Am I a silly old woman ? 
I dream of you every night. I would be a washer- 
woman and live in Gesner’s Kow, if I might have 
you for my daughter, never to leave me. Now I 
am a silly old woman and I will go to bed.” 

The perfumed sheet was passed to the reader’s 
lips before the next envelope was torn open. 

Dinah’s letter was a sheet of foolscap; it was 
written as a diary. 

The first entry was merely an account of attend- 
ing a concert with John ; the second stated in a few 
strong words the failure of a bank. Old Mr. Ham- 
merton had lost a large amount of money and had 
had a stroke of paralysis. 

The third contained the history of a call from Sue ; 
how tall and elegant she looked in her rich mourn- 
ing, and how she had talked about her courtship 
and marriage all the time. 

The fourth day their father had had an attack of 
pain, but it had not lasted as long as usual. 

The last page was filled in Dine’s eager, story- 
telling style: 

“Just to think, Tessa, now I know the end of 
my romance. It was dark Jast night just before 
tea, and I went into the front hall for something 


384 TESSA WADSWORTH' S DISCIPLINE. 


that I wanted to get out of the hat-stand drawer. 
The sitting-room door stood slightly ajar; I did not 
know that Gus was with father until I heard his 
voice. I did not listen, truly I did not; after I 
heard the first sentence I didn’t dare stir for fear 
of making my presence known. I moved off as 
easily and swiftly as I could, but I heard every 
word as plainly as if I had been in the room. It 
is queer that I should overhear the beginning and 
the ending of poor Gus’s only romance, isn’t it? 
I heard him say, ‘Every thing is changed in my 
plans; father is left with nothing but his good 
name, my mother is aged and feeble, my sister is 
a widow with a child; her money is gone, too. I 
am the sole support of four people. I could not 
marry, even if I desired to do so. And since I 
have definitely learned that she does not think of 
me, and never has thought of me, and that she 
thinks of some one else, the bachelor’s life will be 
no great hardship.’ 

“ I had got to the parlor door by that time, so, 
of course, I never can know father’s answer. But 
isn’t it dreadful ? I suppose that he is over the dis- 
appointment, for his voice sounded us cool as usual ; 
too cold, I thought. I should have liked him bet- 
ter if he had been in a fiutter. I shall never tell 
any body but John. Poor old, wise old, dear old 
Gus ! He will pursue the even tenor of his unmar- 
ried way, and no one will ever guess that he has 
had a romance. Pejfiaps Felix Harrison has had 
one, too. Perhaps every body has.” 


BLUE MYRTLE. 


385 


So it was Dinah, after all. And she had fought 
her long, hard fights all for nothing. 

It was Dine, and now her father would under- 
stand ; he would not think her blind and stupid ; he 
would not be disappointed that she had not chosen 
his choice ! 

And that it was herself that Gus Hammerton 
had loved, the wife of John Woodstock always 
believed. And that it was herself, Tessa never 
knew; for not knowing that he had stood at the 
window that night that Dr. Towne had brought 
her home, and witnessed their parting at the gate, 
how could she divine that “ definitely learned that 
she does not think of me,” had referred to her? 

Mr. Wadsworth had listened in utter bewilder- 
ment, recalling Tessa’s repeated declaration that it 
was Dinah. “I am in my dotage,” he thought; 
“ for I certainly understood that he said Tessa.” 

“ My wish was with your wish,” he said. 

“ She will be better satisfied,” Mr. Hammer- 
ton answered in his most abrupt tone. “ He is 
a fine man; I can understand his attraction for 
her.” 

Mrs. Wadsworth entered at that instant and the 
conversation was too fraught with pain to both 
ever to be resumed; therefore it fell out that Mr. 
Hammerton was the only one in the world who 
ever knew, beyond a perhaps, which of the sisters 
he had asked of the father. 

That Tessa had not been influenced by his im- 
portunate and mistaken urging, was one of the 


386 TESSA WADSWORTHS DISCIPLINE. 

things that her father was thankful for to the end 
of his days. 

“ Poor Gus ! The dear, brave boy,” sighed Tessa 
over her letter. “And my worry has only been to 
reveal to me that 1 can not reason myself into lov- 
ing or not loving.” 

A paragraph in Nan Gerard’s letter was dwelt 
long upon; then the daintily written pink sheet 
dropped from her fingers and she sat bending for- 
ward looking into the glowing brands until the 
lights were out down -stairs and Hilda’s heavy 
step had passed her door. 

“Oh, Naughty Nan!” she said rousing herself, “I 
hope that you love him very, very much. Better 
than I know how to do I ” 

The paragraph ran in this fashion : 

“I have had a very pretty present; I really be- 
lieve that I like it better than any thing that Eob- 
ert ever gave me. It is a ring with an onyx : on 
the stone is engraved two letters in monogram. 
You shall guess them, my counsellor, and it will 
not be hard when I whisper that one of them is T. 
I am very happy and very good. ‘ Nan’s Experi- 
ment ’ is burnt up and with it all my foolishness. 
‘Such as 1 wish it to be.’ I think of that whenever 
I look at my ring. Tell me all about your lovely 
Miss Sarepta. I like to know how I shall have 
to behave before her. We are to be married next 
month.” 

Did Nan know the hurt and the hurt and the 
hurt of love? No wonder that she was “shy” with 


BLUE MYRTLE. 


387 


Mrs. Towne. Why had not Mrs. Towne told her ? 
Must she write and congratulate Naughty Nan 
whose story was such as she wished it to be? 

The letters that she had written that evening 
were on the bureau; the sudden remembering of 
the line that she had written in Mrs. Towne’s 
brought her to her feet with a rush of shame 
like the old hot flashes from head to foot; she 
seized the letter and rolling it up tucked it down 
among the coals; it blazed, burning slowly, the 
flame curled around the words that she had been 
saved just in time from sending; the words that 
would never be written or spoken. 

The room was chilly and the candle had burnt 
out before she went to bed ; the lights opposite had 
long been out. The room was cold and dark and 
strange ; outside in the darkness the night was wild. 

It was too late; her conflict had lasted too long; 
her pride and disdain had killed his love for her; 
perhaps he felt as she did in that time when she 
had wanted some one to love her, and he had taken 
Naughty Nan as she had taken Felix. 

She had lived it all through once; she could 
live it all through again; she could have slept, but 
would not for fear of the waking. Oh, if it would 
never come light, and she could lie forever shielded 
in darkness! But the light crept up higher and 
higher into the sky, Hilda passed the door, and 
Uncle Knox’s heavy tread was in the hall below. 

Another day had come, and other days would 
always be coming ; every day life must be full of 


388 T£SSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 


work and play, even although Dr. Towne had 
failed in love that was patience; she had suffered 
once, because he was slow to understand himself, 
and plainly he had suffered to the verge of his 
endurance, because she was slow in understand- 
ing herself! 

The day wore on to tmlight; she had worked 
listlessly; in the twilight she laid her work aside, 
and went over to the cottage. 

“ I have something to show you,” said Miss Sa- 
repta ; “ guess what my last good gift from Philip 
is.” 

“I did not know that he had any thing left to 
give you.” 

“It is the last and best. A flower of spring!” 
From a thick, envelope in her work-basket, she 
drew out a photograph, and, with its face upward, 
laid it in Tessa’s hand. 

A piquant face : daring in the eyes, sweetness on 
the lips. 

“Nan Gerard!” cried Tessa, catching her breath 
with a sound like a sob. 

“Naughty Nan! And they are to be married 
here in this room, that I may be bridesmaid.” 

“ Oh, how stupid I was ! ” 

“ Why, had you an inkling of it ? ” 

“ Several of them, if I had had eyes to see ! ” 

“ It came last night, and I lay awake all night, 
thinking of the woman that Philip will love hence- 
forth better than he loves me.” 

“Oh, how can you bear it?” Tessa knelt on the 


BLUE MYRTLE. 


389 


carpet at her side, with her head on the arm of the 
chair. 

“ I could not, at first. I could not now, if I did 
not love Philip better than I love myself” 

So her sorrow had become Miss Sarepta’s ! She 
drew a long breath, and did not speak. 

“ Don’t feel so sorry for me, dear. I have known 
that in the nature of things, — which is but another 
name for God’s will, — this must come. Even after 
all the years, it has come suddenly. Will she love 
my brother ? ” 

“ I am sure she will ; more and more as the years 
go on!” 

“Every heart must choose for itself,” said Miss 
Sarepta dreamily, “and the choice of the Lord 
runs through all our choices.” 

Tessa’s lips gave a glad assent. 

A letter from Dinah that evening ended thus: 
“Father is not at all well; I think that he grows 
weaker every day. To-day he said, ‘ Isn’t it almost 
time for Tessa to come?”’ 

At noon the next day she was in Dunellen. 


XXVI. 


ANOTHER MAY. 

May came with blossoms, lilacs, and a birthday ; 
she smiled all to herself over last year’s reverie ; the 
anniversary of the day in which she had walked 
homewards with Mr. Hammerton and accepted Fe- 
lix in the evening followed the birthday; a sad an- 
niversary for Felix, she remembered, for he had her 
habit of retrospection. 

The days slipped through his mind, Laura had 
told her; he would often ask the day of the week 
or month. He had become quiet and melancholy, 
seemingly absorbed in the interest of the moment. 
He had greeted Tessa as he would have greeted 
any friend, at their last interview, and she had left 
him believing that his future would not be without 
happiness. A year ago to-day, Mr. Hammerton had 
said that a year made a difference, sometimes. And 
this year ! How the events had hurried into each 
other, jostling against each other like good-hu-' 
mored people in a crowd ! A year ago to-day she 
had thought of Nan Gerard as the wife of Kalph 
Towne; to-day she was sailing on the sea. Professor 
Towne’s wife; just as naughty as ever, but rather 


ANOTHER MAY. 


391 


more dignified. A year ago to-night she had held 
herself the promised wife of her old tormentor, Fe- 
lix Harrison ; since that night all his future had be- 
come a blank, the strong man had become as a 
little child; since that day Dine had found her 
wonderful John; since that day Dr. Lake had had 
his heart’s desire, and had been called away from 
Sue, leaving her a widow; the hurrying year had 
taken from Gus a long hope and had given him a 
future of hard work with meagre wages. And Dr. 
Towne ! But she could not trust herself to think 
of him. They met as usual, not less often; he had 
grown graver since last year, and had thrown him- 
self heart and soul into his work : never demonstra- 
tive, his manner towards her, had, if possible, be- 
come less and less intrusive ; but ever responsive, 
having nothing to respond to, now, but a gen- 
tle deference, a shyness that increased; a stranger 
would have said, meeting him with Tessa Wads- 
worth, that he was intensely interested in her, but 
exceedingly in doubt of finding favor. 

But Tessa could not see this; she felt only the 
restraint and chilliness. 

Once they were left suddenly alone together; he 
excused himself and abruptly left her; clearly, he 
had no reply to make to her letter; his love was 
worn out with her freaks and whims. 

“ I deserve it,” she said, taking stern pleasure in 
meting out justice to herself. 

One afternoon in late May, she found herself on 
the gnarled seat that the roots "'had braided for 


392 TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE, 


her; she had been gazing down into the brook and 
watching a robin-redbreast taking his bath in it, 
canary-fashion ; she watched him until he had flown 
away and perched upon a post of the Old Place 
meadow fence, then her eyes came back to the 
water, the stones, and the weeds. 

“ I always know where to find you ! ” The ex- 
clamation could be in no other loud voice ; she rec- 
ognized Sue before she lifted her eyes to the tall, 
black-draped figure. If Sue had had a sorrow, there 
was no trace of it in voice or countenance. 

“ Isn’t it dusty ? How I shall look trailing around 
in all this black stuff*! What do you always come 
here for? Do you come to meet somebody ?” 

“ It seems that I have come to meet you.” 

“Don’t you remember how you talked to me 
here that day? I did keep my promise; I was 
good to Gerald. Poor, dear Gerald 1 I have noth- 
ing to reproach myself with.” 

“Did mother send you here?” 

“ She said that I would find you between the end 
of the planks and Mayfield. Come through the 
grounds of Old Place with me. I want you to see 
Mrs. Towne’s flowers and a new arbor that Dr. 
Towne has been putting up.” 

“No, thank you,” said Tessa rising and tossing 
away a handful of withering wild flowers. 

“You don’t know how lovely the place is. Dr. 
Towne is always thinking of some new thing to do ; 
I asked him if it were for that grand wife that he 
has been waiting so long for, and, do you believe, he 


ANOTHER MAY. 


393 


said ‘Yes,’ as sincerely as could be. He looked up 
at his mother and smiled when he said it, too. I 
believe they know something. Nan Gerard didn’t 
get him any way! Won’t she have a lovely time 
travelling! I always did want to go to Europe; 
Gerald never would have taken me. I can’t be- 
lieve that he’s dead, can you ? ” 

As Tessa was busy with her veil and did not 
speak. Sue rattled on. 

“Did you know that I’ve been making another 
'visit at Miss Gesner’s? They call their place Blos- 
som Hill, and it has been so sweet with blossoms.” 
“ Is she as lovely as ever ? ” 

“I don’t know,” said Sue, doubtfully; “some- 
times I think that she is stiff and proud; the truth 
is she doesn’t like to have her old brother pay at- 
tention to me. She thinks that he is too old a boy 
for such nonsense ; but he doesn’t think so ! Good 
for me that he doesn’t. What are you walking so 
fast for ? I went to drive with him every day after 
business hours ; we did look stylish ! ” 

“With Miss Gesner, too?” queried Tessa, in a 
voice that she could not steady. 

“No, indeed,” laughed Sue, “and that’s the beau- 
ty of it. What did we want her along for? Of 
course we talked about Gerald; we talked a great 
deal about him. I told him how kind he had been 
to me and how I adored him and how I mourned 
for him. I am sure that I cried myself sick; Dr. 
Towne gave me something one night to keep me 
from having hysterics ! I should have died of 


394 TESSA WADSWORTH^ S DISCIPLINE. 

grief if Mrs. Towne hadn’t taken me to Old Place; 
she was like a mother, and he was as kind as kind 
could be ! It was like the other time before I was 
engaged to Gerald ; I couldn’t believe that it wasn’t 
that time. The Gesners were kind, too ; I thought 
at first that Miss Gesner really loved me ; but she 
began to be stiff after she saw her brother kiss me. 
I couldn’t help it ; I told him that it was too soon 
for such goings on.” 

“ 0, Sue ! ” cried Tessa, wearily. “ And he loved 
you so.” 

“ Gerald ! Of course he did ! But that’s all past 
and gone ! He can’t expect me never to have any 
good times, can he ? He didn’t leave me any money 
to have a good time with ! I’m too young to shut 
myself up and think of his grave all the time. You 
and father are the most unreasonable people I ever 
saw ! Why, he thinks because he thinks of mother 
every day, and wouldn’t be married for any thing, 
that I must be that kind of a mourner, too ! It’s 
very hard; nobody ever had so much trouble as I 
do. I never used to like John Gesner, but you 
don’t know how interesting he can be. He took 
off my wedding ring one day and said it didn’t fit. 
It always was a little too large. Gerald said that 
I would grow into it,” she said, slipping it up and 
down on her finger and letting it drop on the grass. 

“ There ! ” with a little laugh as she stooped to 
look for it, “ suppose I could never find it. Is that 
what you call an omen, Tessa ? Help me look ! ” 

“No, let it be. Let it be buried, too.” 


ANOTHER MAY. 


395 


“There! I have found it. You needn’t be so 
cross to me. I wonder why you are cross to me. 
Gerald said once that you would be a good friend 
to me forever.” 

“ I will, Susie,” said Tessa, fervently. 

“You always liked Gerald. What did you like 
him for ? ” asked Sue, curiously. 

As the answer was not forthcoming. Sue started 
off on a new branch of the old topic. “ Mr. John 
Gesner is going to Europe this fall, or in the win- 
ter ; he is going on business, but he says that if he 
had a wife to go around with him that he would 
stay a year or two. Wouldn’t that be grand? 
Nan Gerard will have to be home when the Sem- 
inary opens, anyway. It would be grand to travel 
for two years.” 

“ Why does not Miss Gesner go with him ? ” 

“ Oh, she wouldn’t leave Lewis. Lewis and Blos- 
som Hill are her two idols. Mr. John says that if 
he were married, he would build a new house right 
opposite, and he asked me as we passed the grand 
houses which style I liked best. There was one 
with porticoes and columns, I chose that. He said 
that it could be built while he was away, and be 
all ready for him to bring his bride home to. But 
you are not listening; you never think of what I 
am saying,” Sue said, in a grumbling, tearful voice. 
“My friends are forever misunderstanding me. 
Gerald never misunderstood me. What do you 
think Dr. Towne said to me ? He said that when 
I am old, I shall love Gerald better than any one; 


396 TESSA WADSWORTH'S DISCIPLINE. 


that what comes between will fall out and leave 
that time. Won’t it be queer? He said that wo- 
men ought to think love the best thing in the 
world. I cried while he was talking. I can love 
any body that is kind to me. When I told John 
Gesner that, he said, ‘I will always be kind to 
you.’ But you are not listening; I verily believe 
that you care more for that squirrel than you do 
for me ! ” 

“ See it run,” cried Tessa. “ Isn’t it a perfect little 
creature ? If you will come and stay a week with 
me, we will take a walk every day.” 

“I can’t — now,” Sue stumbled over her words. 
“Say, Tessa, Mr. Gesner has given me a set of 
pearls. I can wear pearls in mourning, can’t I ? ” 

“With your mourning, you can wear any thing.” 

“ Can I ? I didn’t know it. It’s awful lonesome 
at home; lonesomer than it ever was.” 

“ I would come and stay a week with you, but I 
do not like to leave father ; he is not so strong as 
he was last summer.” 

“You wouldn’t let Mr. Gesner come and spend 
the evening; I haven’t asked him, but I’m going 
to ask him the next time I see him.” 

Dr. Greyson called for Sue late in the evening. 
“ I have the comfort of my old age hard and fast,” 
he said; “she will never want to run away from 
me again, will you, Susie ? ” 

“I don’t know,” said Sue, with a hard, uncom- 
fortable laugh; “you must keep a sharp lookout. 
I may be in Africa by this time next year.” 


XXVII. 


SUNSET. 

“Father is very feeble,” said Mrs. Wadsworth 
one day in June. “I shall persuade him to take 
a vacation. Lewis Gesner told him yesterday that 
he must take a rest; do you notice how he spends 
all his evenings on the sofa ? I think that if Gus 
would come and play chess as he used to that it 
would rouse him.” 

The week of Mr. Wadsworth’s vacation ran into 
two weeks and into a month ; Dr. Greyson fell into 
a friendly habit of calling daily; Mr. Lewis Ges- 
ner and Mr. Hammerton came for a chat^ith him 
on the piazza as often as every other day, some- 
times one of them would pass the evening beside 
his lounge in the sitting-room. Mr. Hammerton 
amused him by talk of people and books with a 
half hour of politics thrown in; and Mr. Gesner 
with his genial voice and genial manner helped 
them all to believe that life had its warm corners, 
and that an evening all together, with the feeble 
old man on the lounge an interested listener, was 
certainly one of the cosiest. 


398 TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 


“ Father, why have you kept Mr. Gesner to your- 
self all these years?” Tessa asked after one of these 
evenings. 

“I would have brought him home before, if I 
had known that you would have found him so 
charming.” 

“ He is my ideal of the shadow of a rock in a 
weary land,” she answered; “ I do not wonder that 
his sister’s heart is bound up in him. How can 
brothers who live together be so different ? ” 

“John is well enough,” said her father, “there’s 
nothing wrong about him.” 

“He makes me creep,” said Tessa, vehemently, 
thinking of a pair of bracelets that Sue had brought 
to show her that day. 

Mr. Wadsworth lay silent for awhile, then open- 
ing his eyes gazed long at the figures and faces 
that were all his world; Mrs. Wadsworth’s chair 
was at the foot of the lounge, the light from the 
lamp on the table fell on her busy hands, leaving 
her face^ shadow ; Dinah was reading at the table, 
with one hand pushed in among her curls ; Tessa 
had dipped her pen into the ink and was carelessly 
holding it between thumb and finger before writ- 
ing the last page of her three sheets to Miss 
Sarepta. 

“ Oh my three girls ! ” he murmured so low that 
no one heard. 

Mrs. Wadsworth, in these days, was forgetting 
to be sharp, and hovered over him and lingered 
around him as lovingly as ever Tessa did. 


SUNSET. 


399 


“ Doctor,” said Tessa, standing on the piazza 
with Dr. Greyson late one evening, “do you think 
that he may die suddenly ? ” 

“Yes.” 

“Any time, when the pain comes?” 

“Any hour when the pain comes.” 

“ Does mother know ? ” 

“I think that she half suspects; she has asked 
me, and I have evaded the question.” 

“ Does he know it ? ” 

“ He has known it since March.” 

Since he had wanted her to come home ! 

“ Perhaps he has told mother.” 

“ She would only excite him and hasten the end.” 

“ She can be quiet enough when she chooses. I 
am glad — oh, I am so glad — ” 

“ Is the doctor gone ? ” cried Dinah rushing out, 
“ father wants him. He has the pain dreadfully.” 

The paroxysm was severe, but it passed away; 
Dr. Greyson decided to remain through the night; 
he fell asleep in the sitting-room and was awakened 
by Tessa’s hand an hour before dawn. 

“Thank you, dear,” said Mr. Wadsworth to his 
wife as she laid an extra quilt across his feet. 

They were his last words. Tessa always liked 
to think of them. 

July, August, and September dragged themselves 
through sunny days and rainy days into October. 
Tessa had learned that she could live without her 
father. There was little outward 'change in their 
home, the three were busy about their usual work 


400 TESSA WADSWORTH^S DISCIPLINE. 

and usual recreations; friends came and went; Tessa 
wrote and walked ; gave two afternoons each week 
to Mrs. Towne, sometimes in Dunellen and some- 
times at Old Place ; ran in, as of old, for a helpful 
talk with Miss Jewett, not forgetting that she must 
be, what Dr. Lake had said, — a good friend to his 
wife. These were the busy hours ; in the still hours, 
— but who can know for another the still hours? 

Mr. Hammerton and Mr. Lewis Gesner proved 
themselves to be invaluable friends ; Tessa’s warm 
regard for Mr. Gesner, even with the shock that 
came to her afterward, never became less; he ever 
remained her ideal of the rock in the weary land. 

Two weeks after her father’s funeral, she had 
stood alone one evening towards dusk among her 
flowers : she had been gathering pansies and think- 
ing that her father had always liked them and 
talked about them. 

There was a sound of wheels on the grass and a 
carriage stood at the opening in the shrubbery ; the 
face into which she looked this time was not worn, 
or thin, or excited; a dark face, with grave, sym- 
pathetic eyes, was bending towards her. 

“ I wish that I could help you,” he said. 

“I know you do. No one can help me. I do 
not need help. I am helped.” 

“The air is sweet to-night.” 

“And so still! Do you like my pansies? ” 

“Yes.” 

“Will you take them to your mother, and tell 
her that I will come to-morrow.” 


SUNSET. 


401 


“I will tell her; but I will keep the pansies for 
myself, if you will give them to me.” 

She laid them in his hand with fingers that 
trembled. 

“Do they say something to me?” 

“They say a great deal to me!” 

“What do they say? ” 

“ I can not find a meaning for you. They must 
be their own interpreter.” 

“But I may think that you gave them to me to 
keep as long as I live.” 

“Yes; to keep as long as you live.” 

“ When you have something to say to me — some- 
thing that you know I am waiting to hear — ^will 
you say it, freely, of your own accord.” 

“Yes, freely, of my own accord.” 

“ I regret to trouble you; but if you ever waited, 
you know that it is the hardest of hard work.” 

“I know,” said Tessa, her voice breaking; “but 
you may not like what 1 say.” 

“ Perhaps you will say what I like then.” 

“I will if I caw.” 

What had she to say, freely, of her own accord? 
I think that it was the knowledge of what she 
would say by and by when she was fully sure that 
helped her to bear the loneliness of this summer 
and autumn. 

And thus passed the summer that she had planned 
for rest. November found her making plans for win- 
ter. Her last winter’s work had been sent to her, 
one volume with its new illustrations, and the oth- 


402 TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 


er, with but one new picture ; her father had looked 
forward to them ; she sent copies to Elsie, Mabel, and 
Sue, also to Felix Harrison and Mr. Hammerton; 
Miss Jewett and Mrs. Towne made pretty and 
loving speeches over theirs ; Tessa wondered, why, 
when she had written them with all her heart, they 
should seem so little to her now. 

“Where is your novel. Lady Blue,” Mr. Hammer- 
ton, asked one evening. 

“ I think that I shall live it first,” she answered, 
seriously. “ I couldn’t love my ideal well enough 
to put him into a book, and the real hero would 
only be lovable and commonplace, and no one would 
care to read about him — no one would care for him 
but me.” 

“ It must be something of an experience to learn 
that one’s ideal can not be loved, and rather humil- 
iating to find one’s self in love with some one be- 
low one’s standard.” 

“ That’s what life is for, — to have an experience, 
isn’t it?” 

“It seems to be some people’s experience,” he 
said, looking as wise as an owl, and as unsympa- 
thetic. 

November found Sue making plans, also. Her 
plans came out in this wise : she called one morn- 
ing to talk to Tessa; Tessa was sewing in her own 
chamber, and Sue ran up lightly, as lightly as in 
the days before Gerald Lake had come to Dunellen. 

“ Busy ! ” she said blithely, her flowing crape veil 
fluttering at the door. 


SUNSET. 


403 


“Not too busy. Come in.” 

Sue talked for an hour with her gloves on, then, 
carelessly, as she described some pretty thing that 
the Professor’s wife had brought from over the sea, 
she drew the glove from her left hand, watching 
Tessa’s face. The quick color — the quick, indig- 
nant color — repaid the manoeuvre; the wedding 
ring — the new wedding ring — was gone, and in 
its stead blazed a cluster of diamonds. 

“ You might as well say something,” began Sue, 
moving her hand in the sunlight. 

“ I have nothing to say. I wonder how you dare 
come to me.” 

“ Why shouldn’t I dare ? I know it seems soon ; 
but circumstances make a difference, and Mr. Ges- 
ner has to go to Europe next month. He took the 
other ring; I couldn’t help it — I wouldn’t have 
kept it safe with a lock of his hair in a little box 
— but he said that I shouldn’t have this unless I 
gave him that.” 

Tessa’s head went down over her work; she had 
not wept aloud before since she was a little girl, 
but now the sobs burst through her lips uncon- 
trolled. That ring that Dr. Lake had carried that 
day in the rain not fourteen months ago ! 

Sue sprang to her feet, then dropped back into 
her chair and wept in sympathy, partly with a 
vague feeling of having done some dreadful thing, 
partly with the fear that life in a foreign land 
might not be wholly alluring; Mr. Gesner was 
kind, but poor Gerald had loved her so! 


404 TESSA WADSWORTH^S DISCIPLINE. 


“ 0, Tessa ! Tessa ! don’t,” she cried. “ Stop cry- 
ing and speak to me.” 

“ Go away from me. Go home. I will not speak 
to you.” 

For a moment Sue waited, then she arose and 
moved towards the door, standing another mo- 
ment, but as Tessa did not turn or speak, she went 
down-stairs, not lightly, hushed by the revelation 
of a grief that she could not understand. 


XXVIII. 


HEARTS ALIKE. 

Early in December, in a snow-storm, Sue Lake 
was married to John Gesner. 

“ Some things are incomprehensible,” declared 
Mrs. Wadsworth, plaintively, looking at the snow, 
“ to think that she should marry an old beau of 
mine. So soon, too. How a widow can ever 
think — ” 

Tessa refused to see her married until the last 
moment. “You must be a good friend to me 
through thick and thin,” Sue coaxed, and Tessa 
went the evening before; but the evening was 
long and silent, for Tessa could not talk or admire 
Sue’s outfit. The pretty brown and crimson chairs 
were again wheeled before the back parlor grate; 
but when Sue went out to attend for the last time 
to her father’s lunch, there was no hilarious en- 
trance, and Tessa’s tears dropped because they 
would not be restrained. 

Sue’s talk and laughter sounded through the 
hall; but Tessa could hear only “Good-by, Mystic; 
you and I will have our talk another day.” 


406 TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 


“Kiss me and say you are glad,” prayed Sue, 
when they went up to Sue’s chamber to exchange 
white silk and orange blossoms for travelling at- 
tire. “ It’s horrid for you to look like a funeral. 
Mrs. Towne looks glum, and Miss Gesner had to 
cry ! ” 

The snow-flakes were falling and melting, as they 
were falling and melting the day that Sue sang for 
Dr. Lake ; there was a fire in the air-tight to-day, 
and by some chance the low rocker had been 
pushed close to the side of the white-draped bed. 
Sue seated herself in it to draw on her gloves and 
for a last hurried, hysteric flow of words. 

“ I’ll write to you from Liverpool, Tessa. I hope 
that we sha’n’t have any storms; I might think 
that it was a judgment. I don’t want to be drowned ; 
I want to see London and Paris and Koine. Isn’t 
it queer for me to be married twice before you are 
married once ! ” 

“ You may be married three times before I am 
married once,” said Tessa, opening a bureau drawer 
to lay away an old glove box. 

“Oh, no, I sha’n’t ! I’ll stay a rich widow, but 
it was distressed to stay a poor one. Did I tell 
you that Stacey is married ? I was so delighted. 
He’s got a good wife, too; real sober and settled 
down. So I didn’t do so much harm after all your 
fuming and fussing. I like to make people com- 
fortable when I can. And now we’re happy all 
around just like a book. I wonder what will be- 
come of you before I get back. I expect that Dine 


HEARTS ALIKE. 


407 


will be married. John is as tickled as he can be ! 
It’s lovely to be an old man’s darling ; I am to have 
my own way about every thing. I’m glad that he 
wasn’t a widower ; I hate widowers ! ” 

A tap at the door summoned Sue. “ Good-by, 
dear old room!” she cried gayly. “You’ve seen 
the last of me. I hope that you will get every 
thing you are waiting for, Tessa.” 

As once before on Sue’s wedding day, Tessa was 
taken home in Dr. Towne’s carriage. 

“ I wonder if he knows,” she said. 

“If he do it can not trouble him. He under- 
stood her.” 

“I am beginning to understand what the hurt 
of love is.” 

“ What is it?” 

“Don’t you know?” 

“ I think that you are teaching me.” 

“It is a lesson that we have learned together. 
I used to wonder why God ever let us hurt each 
other ; perhaps that is the reason, that we may learn 
together what love is I ” 

“ Do not the students ever come to the end of 
the chapter and learn the next lesson ? ” 

“ I do not know what the next chapter is.” 

“Perhaps if we study hard we may learn that 
together.” 

Great patience is needed to learn a lesson with 
me.” 

“ I have a great deal of patience.” 

“ I’m afraid that I haven’t.” 


408 TESSA WADSWORTH^S DISCIPLINE. 


“ Having confessed our sins, suppose that we for- 
get them.” 

“I can’t forget mine.” 

“ Can you forget mine ? ” 

She tried to speak, but the words stumbled on 
her lips. 

“ Look up and answer me.” 

She could not look up ; she could not answer. 

“Tessa, say something.” 

“ Something,” she said childishly between laugh- 
ter and tears. 

After a moment, during which her glove had 
been unbuttoned and rebuttoned and he had leaned 
back, holding the reins loosely, she spoke : 

“You have been patient with me. I will not 
have any more whims or fancies — I know now 
beyond any need of reasoning — ” 

“ What do you know ? ” 

“ Something very happy.” 

“ And now shall we be as happy as Sue and her 
rich old lover ? ” 

“Do you see this ring?” touching the emerald. 
“ It means that I must tell your mother that I am 
satisfied, fully and entirely and thoroughly, before 
I say ‘Yes.’” 

“ Can you tell her that ? ” 

“ Ask her and she will tell you.” 

“ Tessa, it has been a weary time.” 

“ I think that there must always be a weary time 
before two people understand each other; I am so 
glad to have ours come before — ” 


HEARTS ALIKE. 


409 


The sun set behind clouds on Sue’s second wed- 
ding day. Tessa tried to write, she tried to read, 
she tried to sew, she tried to talk to her mother 
and Dine ; but failed in every thing but sitting idle 
at one of the parlor windows and looking out at the 
snow. There was a long evening in the shabby par- 
lor; quiet talk, laughing talk, and merry talk min- 
gled with half sentences, as many things both old 
and new were talked about. 

There were several happenings after this ; one of 
them, of course, was Dinah’s marriage to her won- 
derful John ; Tessa’s wedding gift to her was a deed 
of the house in which they had both been born. 
Another happening, perhaps, as much in the nature 
of things as Dinah’s marriage, although the girls 
could not bring themselves to think so, was their 
mother’s marriage to Mr. Lewis Gesner. Tessa re- 
membered her promise to her father; she spoke 
no word against it, and by repeated chidings kept 
Dinah’s words and behavior within the limits of 
deference. 

Pretty little Mrs. Wadsworth was a radiant bride,* 
and the bridegroom was all that could be desired ; 
Mrs. Wadsworth prudently concealed her elation at 
having married a man richer than Tessa’s husband 
and with a residence far handsomer. Mr. Lewis 
Gesner became the kindest of husbands and Miss 
Gesner was a model sister-in-law. 

On her own wedding day, one of Tessa’s grate- 
ful thoughts was that her father would rejoice to 
know that his “ three girls ” were in happy homes. 


410 TESSA WADSWORTWS DISCIPLINE. 


Miss Jewett’s congratulation was a dower in it- 
self: “Your fate was worth waiting for, Tessa.” 

“Another poor man undone through you, Lady 
Blue,” said Mr. Hammerton. “ I might have known 
that you were growing up to do it.” 

“Is Tessa married?” Felix asked in his slow way. 
“ I hope that he will take good care of her.” 

Another happening was the arrival of Mr. and 
Mrs. John Gesner and son. The baby had been 
born in Germany and could call his own name be- 
fore he came home to Blossom Hill. 

The name was a surprise to Tessa : “ Theodore, 
because it has such a pretty meaning,” Sue told 
her. “His father wanted John or Lewis, but I in- 
sisted; I said that I would throw the baby away 
if I couldn’t name him ! ” 

She petted him and was proud of his rosy face 
and bright eyes, but confided to Tessa that he was 
a great deal of trouble, and that she hated that 
everlasting “mamma, mamma.” 

“I don’t understand 2/ow, Tessa, you treat your 
little girl as if she were a princess.” 

That afternoon Tessa and the baby were alone 
on one of the balconies at Old Place ; baby in her 
betucked and berufiled white frock and white shoes 
was taking her first steps alone, and baby’s moth- 
er was kneeling before her with both arms out- 
stretched to receive her after the triumph. 

Baby’s father stood in a window watching them ; 
but for the eyes that, just now, were like the woods 
in October, his face would have been pronounced 


HEARTS ALIKE. 


411 


grave; the white threads in his hair were begin- 
ning to be noticeable, and before baby would be 
old enough to drive all around the country with 
him, his hair would be quite white. 

“An earnest man with a purpose in his life,” 
Dunellen said. 

“ Must you go out again so soon ? ” 

Baby was crowing over her success, and the 
mother’s arms were holding her close. 

“ There’s a poor woman with a little baby that 
I must see to-night.” 

“ A girl-baby ? ” 

“Yes,” smiling down at her, “a girl-baby.” 

“ Poor little girl-baby ! Foot little girl-baby ! ” 
she said, pressing her lips to baby^’s hair. 

“ What were you thinking when the baby ran 
into your arms just now ? ” 

“ I was thinking,” holding the beruffled little fig- 
ure closer, “that it isn’t such a hard world, after 
all, for little girls to grow up in.” 


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